


Pandora's Box

by ratherastory



Category: Supernatural RPF
Genre: F/M, M/M, Psychic Bond
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-07-11
Updated: 2011-07-11
Packaged: 2017-10-21 06:55:59
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 7
Words: 97,814
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/222196
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ratherastory/pseuds/ratherastory
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The <i>Avatar</i> fusion fic in which recently-paralyzed Marine Jensen Ackles goes to the distant moon of Pandora, meets the love of his life Jared, and discovers everything that's truly important to him.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Arrival

**Prologue –Arrival**

Jensen doesn't remember when the dreams started, but he knows it was shortly after he landed in the VA hospital, with the gaping hole in his spine a nice, visceral, physical representation of the hole that just got blown in the middle of his life. The hole in his plans. The hole in his boat, scuttling everything he'd ever pinned his hopes on. The first dream caught him by surprise, because he'd never in his life dreamed of flying before. He was soaring high above the most beautiful rainforest he'd ever seen, not that he was in the habit of comparing the relative beauty of the rainforests where he'd had the misfortune of being stationed. When you're a foot soldier, the only thing you can look forward to in a rainforest is being wet and covered in bug bites. But this? This was different. He was light, and free; transcendent, even. He could feel his heart leap in his chest, blood thrumming in his veins, and with every rush of hot air he climbed higher and higher, until it seemed that he might just be able to reach out and brush his fingers against the lowest-hanging sun in the sky.

His appointed therapist told him it was completely normal for him to have dreams of that sort. That patients who survived life-altering accidents often subconsciously expressed their desire for their old freedom in dreams of running or swimming or flying. Dreams in which their movements weren't impeded by disability or missing pieces of spine. What the therapist hadn't ever been able to explain was the alien terrain, but then, Jensen is pretty sure the man was entirely full of shit and probably kept a couple of extra empty bins around for whenever his bullshit levels got out of hand. He didn't need someone to tell him that he was angry and frustrated for being shoved into a wheelchair after spending a lifetime on his feet and over ten years running to follow other men's orders.

You're not meant to dream when in cryo-stasis. The way it was explained to him, they plunge you into a state not unlike a light coma and the whole process is designed to keep you from ageing the entire five years that it takes for you to travel the whole way to your destination. Sometimes it's longer than five years, even, but Jensen doesn't bother thinking about that, since it doesn't affect him in the slightest. A grinning tech tells him it's like going on the world's longest plane ride, without the jet-lag and with the added benefit of being able to lie completely flat.

"You'll wake up, and it'll be like you just went to bed the day before. Open up, princess, and take your pill."

Instead of the pitch-darkness he expects, though, Jensen finds himself back in the sky, racing as fast as he can toward the mist-covered peaks of mountains he's never seen before, his whole body alive and singing with pure joy. He banks hard to the left, cutting through the clouds, and droplets of water cling to his hair and eyelashes. He lets out a triumphant whoop, catches a rising current of hot air and lets himself drift, higher and higher until the whole world drops away below his feet, leaving him stretching up toward the infinite heavens.

A moment later, he's blinking hard into a harsh, unforgiving light, and another med tech is smiling down at him. "Up and at 'em!"

He swallows thickly, an unpleasant taste coating his mouth. "Are we there?"  
"We're there, sunshine."

The tech pulls open the compartment the rest of the way, then pushes off, floating away easily in the zero-gravity environment. After a moment, Jensen grabs the bars to either side and carefully pulls himself up and out, taking a moment to get his bearings in the pristine white cryo compartment. A voice comes over the loudspeakers, very obviously a recording—Jensen can tell by the emotionless intonations, which sound like the result of someone who has had to repeat the same thing so many times that they are now thoroughly sick of it and never want to see those words every again in all their living days.

 _Attention all personnel: you have been in cryo for five years, nine months and twenty two days. You will be hungry, you will be weak. If you feel nausea, please use the sacks provided for your convenience. The staff thanks you in advance._

The voice keeps going after that, instructing them on the proper procedure to recover their belongings, and informing them of the depressing fact that they're not going to get fed anything like proper food until they get to the surface of Pandora, but that there are protein bars and nutrient shakes available in the meantime. Jensen has never been a fan of recordings, and this one is more annoying than he remembers. Maybe sleeping for nearly six years has just made him crabby. He never was a morning person, even when he was deployed. There's a difference between being up and ready at ass o'clock in the morning, and enjoying the fact that you're up and ready at said ass o'clock.

The only upside right now is that he apparently has fewer problems navigating around the transport ship than his fellow passengers. They keep trying to use their legs to kick off the nearest available surfaces, as if they've forgotten all of their zero-G training. Maybe it's because Jensen has no choice, or maybe it's because he's used to pulling himself along by his hands using bars thanks to all the physical therapy he had to endure, but he finds it pretty easy all told to use the bars provided for him to move around.

Jensen pauses by one of the vid screens showing a tiny fragment of the huge planet that they are orbiting, and traces a finger wonderingly over the image, leaving behind a small smear.

"Well, Tommy," he says under his breath, "here I am."


	2. Opening the Box

**Part I –Opening the Box**

The Sky People always come out late in the mornings. Ìla'rey knows, of course, that they aren't late risers, that they simply come out late because of the many preparations they have to make in order just to survive here in the forest. They come tramping out of their large ugly buildings with all their heavy gear, their loud, noisy trucks, their shouting soldiers. Ìla'rey and his friends have taken to creeping out and watching them, often when they should be hunting, or helping the elders in Home Tree, but it's so much more fun to watch all the new reasons the _humans_ , as they call themselves, find to scurry about in what looks like utter confusion. Perhaps they have reasons of their own, but whatever those reasons might be remains a mystery to Ìla'rey.

The human-occupied area looks to Ìla'rey like a giant scar in the side of the mountain where they began digging when he was only a child. The trees have all been stripped away, the ferns have died, all the animals have long since fled from the noise and smells. It's disgusting and fascinating all at once, and he's been sneaking away from home for as long as he can remember to spy on them, to figure out why it is they do what they do. Ìla'rey spent five interminable years in what the humans call 'school,' learning to speak the language of their majority, which still seems largely unpronounceable to him. They speak using their throats, a harsh, guttural language, and Ìla'rey still resents his parents for forcing him to learn it. Still, it has turned out to have its uses, like today. He and his friend Tsu'tey are perched in one of the trees on the edge of the mining area, all but completely hidden by the dense foliage. The other young warriors with them have found different vantage points along the tree line and it’s only because he knows they’re there that Ìla’rey can even see them. Otherwise, they would be invisible to the naked eye.

Tsu'tey clears his throat. "Ìla'rey, are you sure we should be here? You were supposed to stay in Home Tree today. Won't your mother be angry that you have run off to spy on the sky people again?" Ever the dutiful son, Tsu’tey, Ìla'rey thinks.

"Let her be angry. I promise I will be responsible and take my responsibilities as future _tsahik_ tomorrow."

Tsu'tey punches his shoulder. "You shouldn't joke about that. It will be difficult enough as it is without your making light of it."

"Yes, I know, I should have been born female. What's done is done, and I'm still hoping my parents will have a girl before the end, so I don't have to do it."

"Your parents won't have any more children, you know that."

"Look, there is their Colonel," he says, pointing to where a human with thick scars from an altercation with an _ikran_ , which the humans call banshee, is strutting before the ranks of soldiers, shouting at the top of his lungs.

"What's he saying?" Tsu'tey wants to know. He speaks a little of the language, but hasn't mastered it as well as Ìla'rey, not enough to be able to decipher the shouting at such a distance.

Ìla'rey smirks. "He is lecturing them on the dangers of the forest. They are frightened of everything here, these sky people. They think everything wants to kill them."

Tsu’tey purses his lips. "They are very small. They look like prey. They should not be surprised when the animals try to feed upon them."

In the clearing the little Colonel is still bellowing at his soldiers. Ìla'rey, however, is watching two banshees perched on a nearby outcropping. It’s not mating season, but sometimes the _meikran_ become mates out of more than necessity. Ìla'rey’s mother once told him that they are the only ones of the flying animals who truly understand the meaning of love, which is why the Omaticaya are able to form _tsaheylu_ , the bond, with them. Right now, though, that is not what is uppermost in Ìla'rey’s mind. He turns to Tsu'tey and grins, nodding his head in the direction of the obvious opening, and his friend looks horrified.

"Ìla'rey, you can’t!"

"Of course I can! Just watch me."

He jumps to his feet, unslinging his bow from his shoulder and pulling an arrow from his quiver. Out of the corner of his eye he can see the other young warriors following suit. It’s been a game among them for years, ever since the sky people landed, to use their large machines as target practice. The huge wheels are perfect for it, just soft and yielding enough that arrows embed beautifully in them and stay there, the multi-coloured fletching beautiful as it goes round and round. Today, though, Ìla'rey has one other trick in mind for the sky people. He lifts a hand to his mouth, emits a high-pitched shriek that has Tsu’tey wincing at his side, not because of the sound, but because he knows exactly what will follow.

The _meikran_ surge into the air at the noise, spreading great wings and emitting their own answering shriek, then swoop down toward the tightly-arranged group of soldiers. On the ground, chaos erupts among the humans. There are a few screams from the newest arrivals —they always scare the easiest— and they scatter like insects before a stiff wind, confused and disorientated, buffeted from all sides. Ìla'rey feels his gorge rise when he sees the loud-mouthed Colonel bring up his gleaming metal weapon and take aim at the nearest _ikran_ , obviously meaning to slay it. _Butchers, these humans_ , he thinks disgustedly. Before the humans landed the Omaticaya had never seen guns, and at first the small metallic things had seems ridiculous and puny, but they quickly learned just how deadly the weapons could be. They were useless against most of the bigger animals in the forest, but enough bullets could kill a man, or seriously wound an _ikran_ if it caught one of its wings.

Ìla'rey lets out another yell, more acute this time, and there's a rush of air above his head as Zeizei, his own _ikran_ , comes to perch nearby in a great flapping of wings. In one smooth, practised move, he swings himself up onto her back, forming the bond effortlessly and directing her right into the path of the terrible guns. It's child's play to draw his bow and knock the weapon out of the Colonel's hands, though he is careful not to draw blood—outright conflict with the humans has been forbidden by the _tsahik_ until further notice—and the _meikran_ rise up into the air, still shrieking irritably, and soar into the sky toward the horizon. With a whoop of triumph Ìla'rey brings Zeizei around and sends another volley of arrows at the armoured trucks, watching with satisfaction as the tips bury themselves into the artificial surfaces. All around the other young warriors, Tsu'tey and his friends, are doing much the same, yelling and yipping and shouting as they let loose with volley after volley, safe on the backs of their _meikran_ , well out of reach of the humans' bullets. On Ìla'rey's signal, though, they rise up into the air to make their escape, still cheering and hollering. Ìla'rey exchanges a delighted grin with Tsu'tey.

"Your parents will skin you alive for this!" Tsu'tey yells above the boom of leathery wings beating against the air.

"It was well worth it!" he yells back, then digs his heels into Zeizei's sides and speeds off back into the jungle, away from the Sky People and all their problems.

* * *

There's already a small line-up of people all trying to get to the boarding area of the ship, where the shuttles are docked and waiting to take all the newest arrivals down to the moon's surface. Jensen recovers the pack containing his few belongings from the storage locker he was assigned. He snags a protein bar and a shake from a nearby dispenser, and once he's no longer light-headed from hunger and thirst, he makes his way to the much-smaller area of the ship that's been equipped with artificial gravity so he can change out of the standard-issue cotton scrubs he's spent the last five years and change sleeping in. All things considered, he feels pretty clean. There's a system for that, of course, but he hadn't bothered to listen to the lengthy explanations at the time, figuring he'd be unconscious anyway, and now he kind of regrets the fact that he doesn't know any of it. Maybe he'll look it up later, if there's time.

Tommy would have eaten all this up like it was chocolate pudding, he thinks, and suddenly there's a stabbing pain in his chest so sharp that for a moment he's convinced he's having some sort of heart attack. He muffles his gasp by turning away toward the nearest bulkhead and shoving his knuckles into his mouth, forces himself to take a breath before he freaks out completely. Tommy's been dead for six years, but it only feels like a few months, and the idea that there's nothing left even of the ashes... He closes his eyes, concentrates on breathing, on not freaking out in front of a couple dozen mercenaries, because he's going to live with these people for at least the next five years, and he's already starting at a disadvantage.

He shoves the scrubs into the chute provided for that purpose—he figures they're going to get cleaned or maybe incinerated for all he knows—and tries not to blush when a white-clad tech comes through the doors with the lightweight wheelchair he's going to be using for the next five years. He shakes off someone's well-meaning attempt to help him, swings himself into the chair, and pulls his pack into his lap in order to wheel himself aboard the shuttle. The shuttle —named the Valkyrie, which he assumes is supposed to be symbolic or something— feels surprisingly similar to the army transports he's used all his life: cramped, overly hot, and not smelling too great, and it feels a lot like coming home. He smiles to himself, leans back and keeps his hands firmly wrapped around the straps provided for stability throughout the trip to the moon's surface. The Valkyrie shudders as the thrusters cut out and the vectoring nozzles adjust to bring the shuttle into a slow hover over the ground. They come to a jolting stop with a hiss of moving hydraulics, and the crew chief comes striding out of the cockpit.

"Exopacks on!" he barks, then glares at all of them until he's satisfied his orders are being followed. "Remember, people, you lose your mask, you’re unconscious in two minutes, and after five minutes you’re dead. Let’s nobody be dead today; it looks bad on my report." He spares a glare specifically for Jensen, who's still trying to sort out the elastic straps on his mask. "Exopacks on, let's go!"

Jensen manages not to fumble his gear, gets his rebreather mask on just as the cargo ramp is released. All the other passengers—soldiers to a man—are up and waiting, thumbs hooked into the straps of their packs, apprehension written all over their faces. In about fifteen seconds they're going to set foot on an alien planet (okay, moon, technically, but still alien) for the very first time. In fifteen seconds, it's all about to become real. They move out ahead of him, the crew chief's voice, muffled by his own mask, loud in their ears.

"Go directly the base! Do not stop under any circumstances, do you hear? Proceed directly to the base! Go straight inside!"

It's trickier than Jensen had thought it would be to manoeuvre his wheelchair along the rough ground, and the others quickly outstrip him. The ground here is paved, but it's been used hard and broken up by the passage of dozens of heavy machines, and the going is rough for the thin wheels of his chair. He's forced to come to a halt almost immediately as a huge tractor rumbles past on wheels taller than a truck. The tractor itself is more like a tank, taller than most of the houses Jensen's ever seen, the wheels caked in mud. He blinks when he catches sight of what looks like huge arrows sticking out of the rear tire, fletched with blue, red and green feathers, like they were plucked from some sort of gigantic parrot.

A second later and he's forced to jerk out of the way as some jerk in an ampsuit nearly tramples him, complete with shouted insult from its driver. The things are huge, four times the size of an ordinary human, little more than giant metal frames with a small cockpit, built so that a man can stand inside them and fit his arms and legs into a specially-designed harness that allows him to use the suit as though it's simply an extension of his own body. It takes an incredible amount of fine-motor control to drive an ampsuit, and the drivers are just about as cocky as Air Force pilots about their status. Of course, they conveniently ignore the fact that drivers can't see what's directly under them at all, their view blocked by the floor of their cockpit, making them extremely dangerous to innocent bystanders. Jensen rolls his eyes, shoves his chair forward and nearly runs into two soldiers, one with the insignia of a corporal and a name tag that reads 'Wainfleet,' the other nothing but a private. The corporal sneers at him.

"Would you look at that? Meals on wheels."

The private joins in, sniggering, and Jensen immediately pegs them as cronies. One probably just got promoted, and is letting the other guy hang onto his coattails. "I seen plenty of guys leave here in a wheelchair, never seen one arrive in one before."  
"That is just wrong," the corporal shakes his head. "At least he ain't gonna last long around these parts. Something'll eat him before long."

He ignores them as best he can, and pushes past them until he reaches the entrance to the base, which thankfully has been equipped with a ramp, though more as a way of getting supplies in and out easily rather than as an attempt to keep things handicapped-accessible. Jensen has no idea how easy or difficult it's going to be to move around inside the base itself, but he's dealt with stuff like this before, and at worst it'll just be an inconvenience he'll try to work around, the way he does with everything else that's gone wrong in his life.

* * *

It's a lot like going to basic training, or like any of the other dozen of deployments Jensen has been on. Before he's gotten much farther than the door he's directed peremptorily to the commissary. It's located inconveniently for Jensen down several sets of very busy corridors, made even trickier to navigate by multiple sharp turns and slightly confusing signs. Nothing about this place, it seems, is going to be easy.

He parks himself quietly at the back of the room as a tall man in well-worn fatigues paces in front of his audience of slightly awed-looking Marines and intimidated-looking science nerds and confused-looking civilians. He keeps the giant bay window to his back, and behind him helicopters rise up into the sky and disappear past the giant fence that surrounds the compound, over the horizon. Jensen knows nothing about Colonel Miles Quaritch save that he's the head of security for the Colony, which he's already heard nicknamed Hell's Gate by several of the soldiers who've been here long enough to earn the right to call it anything they damned well please. The Colonel is a handsome man by most standards, square-jawed and bright-eyed, his close-cropped hair faded from blond to silver by the years, except where his scalp has been etched by long parallel scars, no doubt the result of an attack by some local animal. His arms, deeply tanned and muscled, are decorated by a multitude of criss-crossing scars, and his eyes, a steely grey, seem to bore right through Jensen as he takes up his spot as unobtrusively as he can.

"You are not in Kansas anymore," the Colonel is saying, in a voice that clearly used to belong to a drill sergeant. "You are on Pandora, ladies and gentlemen. Respect that fact every second of every day. Out beyond that fence," he points in a dramatic gesture toward the big bay window, "every living thing that crawls, flies or squats in the mud wants to kill you and eat your eyes for jujubees."

The room goes very still at that, and Jensen resists the sudden urge to snort. It's not the first time he's had different thoughts from a superior officer, and he knows better than to voice them aloud. Not unless he wants to find himself doing push-ups for the rest of eternity, regardless of whether he's still enlisted, and regardless of the fact that he's in a wheelchair. Quaritch, oblivious to his train of thought, is still pontificating.

"We have an indigenous population of humanoids here called the _Na’v_ i. They’re fond of arrows dipped in a neurotoxin which can stop your heart in one minute. And they have bones reinforced with naturally-occurring carbon fibre. They are _very hard to kill_. We operate—we live—at a constant threat condition yellow."

That's not exactly reassuring. Jensen's only read up a little bit on the Na'vi—and that was six years ago, even if it feels a little fresher in his mind than that—and none of what he read has prepared him for that. The book he read made them sound like they were sort of like tree-hugging hippie savages, or whatever. In tune with nature and all that crap. It went on and on about social hierarchies and spiritual leaders and used spellings he couldn't wrap his mind around, and all throughout that time he'd been undergoing physical therapy and getting what felt like hundreds of inoculations and signing dozens upon dozens of legal forms and waivers. In short, the last few months before he got put into cryo seem like a distant blur now, and he doesn't remember a damned thing about neurotoxins or unkillable giant aliens.

"As head of security, it’s my job to keep you alive. I will not succeed," Quaritch pauses for effect, taking the time to look each new recruit in the eye before moving on. "Not with all of you. If you wish to survive, you need a strong mental attitude, you need to follow the rules, _Pandora_ rules..."

Jensen allows himself a small smile at that. There's really nothing like an old-fashioned safety briefing to put your mind at ease, he thinks, and make you feel right at home.

* * *

It doesn't take Jensen long to unload his pack in the very cramped quarters he's been assigned. There's barely enough room for him to turn his wheelchair around, but at least it's on the same level as the lab, which means he won't have to negotiate too many ramps or any of the elevators, all of which have buttons that seem to be out of his reach. The bed is at the same level as his chair, which simplifies things considerably, and the walls are entirely unadorned.

"Should have brought a spider plant," he says aloud, just to hear his own voice. It sounds muffled in the close quarters, as though the walls are dampening down the sound.

Maybe he can get one of the local plants to grow in here, although given the radically different atmosphere, he isn't sure that could ever happen. For that matter, he's never kept a potted plant in his life, and doesn't know why he suddenly felt the desire for one. He snorts and shakes his head at his own weird train of thought, and begins sorting through his pack. He unpacks his clothes into the tiny wall unit, stores his toiletries by the sink, and decides to ignore the small computer provided for his personal use in favour of seeking out food and a shower, not necessarily in that order. Fifteen minutes finds him still damp from his shower and navigating his way along the crowded corridors toward the commissary, when a voice sounds out behind him.

"Hey! Um, hello! Hi!" The voice belongs to a tall, gangly, geeky-looking guy with a goatee and a haircut that looks like it was accomplished using a bowl and blunt kitchen scissors. "You're Jensen, right? Jensen Ackles?" He looms over Jensen, all smiles and nervous energy, and thrusts out his hand for him to shake. "I'm Norm Spellman. I was in the avatar training program with your brother, Tom. Wow, you look just like him."

Jensen squints a little dubiously at him, but shakes his hand anyway. "Uh, yeah. Good to meet you?" He turns it into a question.

Norm smacks his forehead. "I mean, duh, of course your look like him. I mean, the whole identical twin thing is the reason you're here right? Um, God, I'm making a mess of this. I'm really sorry about your brother. We weren't close friends or anything, but he was a really great guy. Fantastic sense of humour. Everybody loved him. It was a huge shock when he died."

"Yeah, I'll bet," Jensen manages. "A shock. Sure."

"Um, anyway. Have you seen the lab yet?"

"No, not yet. I was kind of hoping for food."

Norm's face lights up. "Oh, man! No, you should totally come see the lab! I was just heading there myself, and I can't wait to see how it's all set up. I mean, I saw the blueprints and all that during the training, but it's nothing like seeing it in person, you know? Live and in technicolour!" he enthuses, and Jensen can't help but smile in response.

"Yeah, okay. I had a protein bar earlier, so I guess I won't starve."

"Awesome. I want to hear everything about your brother than he never told us himself."

Jensen just manages to bite back the bitter retort that's on the tip of his tongue. Instead he nods noncommittally and wheels himself toward the lab in Norm's wake.

* * *

The last time he and Tommy spoke, they argued about his plans to go to Pandora. It wasn't the first time, either, but somehow it felt more real, now that the deadline was looming. Tommy came to visit him in the hospital, and, yeah, maybe Jensen sort of picked a fight with him, because he was chained to a hospital bed again, prey to an opportunistic infection that was trying to eat away what was left of his spine, and he was frustrated and mad and in pain, and Tommy was a really convenient target.

"So you're just going to up and waltz away to another planet?"

Tommy snorted and rolled his eyes. "I wouldn't exactly call it 'waltzing,' Jenny." He used the childhood taunt deliberately. "I've spent three years training for this, or weren't you listening? No, wait, never mind, I actually know the answer to that question already. You never listen to anything I tell you, because you're not interested in anyone but yourself."

The accusation all but took his breath away. "I.. you...you think I'm selfish?"

Tommy shrugged. "If the shoe fits."

"Fuck you!" he spat. "I'm not the one who ran off when the family needed me. I've been there every step of the goddamned way. Where the hell have you been? Off in your ivory tower with your scientist friends, living off grants. You think you're better than me just because you have a degree?"

"I never said that!"

"You don't need to! Don't think I don't know you, I can see it in your face. Don't forget, that degree didn't come for free, Tom."

Tommy's face closed off. "I'm paying you back, every cent."

"And every cent of that is going back to the farm. Just like every other cent I make that I don't use for food or clothes."

"Or women or alcohol."

"Oh, so I shouldn't have anything at all, is that it? Be a good soldier, keep my head down and wait to die from some random bullet? Oh, hey," he'd looked down at himself, unable to keep the bitterness from his tone, "looks like it's too late for that. But don't worry, bro. If this keeps up, you won't have to pay me back anymore, and the benefits will just go directly to Mom and Dad."

"Jensen..." Tommy's expression turned pained, and for a second Jensen felt bad, laying that on him. It wasn't Tommy's fault he'd been on the wrong end of a land mine that some poor kid in his squad had stepped on. The kid was long gone, and Jensen might as well be.

"Never mind." He shifted uncomfortably in the bed, winced as the wound in his back twinged. Of course, Tommy noticed right off.

"You need something for the pain?"

"It's fine."

"I can call someone, if you want."

"I said, it's fine!"

"Fine," Tommy held up both hands in a gesture of surrender. "I don't get why you're so dead-set against my going. This is a fantastic opportunity for me, Jensen. I get to be at the cutting edge of my field, and the pay is fantastic. I'll be able to pay you back, and maybe get Mom and Dad out...I thought you'd be happy about this," he says, letting his hands drop, and Jensen sighed, because this was exactly how his brother had always been. All ideals and no sense of reality.

"You're leaving for another planet, Tommy. One that it takes five years to get to. It means that the next time I see you will be in fifteen years. We won't celebrate our thirtieth birthdays together, or our fortieth...Fuck, I don't want to get all sentimental or whatever, that's not what this is about. I just... why do you want to get away so badly?"

"I'm not leaving you, Jensen," his brother said, and his tone was gentle, his expression suddenly too understanding, and Jensen really wanted to throw something at him, except there was nothing in here except his pitcher of water, and he'd be wanting that in a minute.

"I don't want your fucking pity," he snapped. "You've always been itching to get away from us, from me. I guess I'm a hell of an embarrassment, huh? This dumb military hick who's got your face, what would you ever tell those nice scientist friends of yours?"

"You're a jerk," Tommy said, but there was no heat behind his words, just the same sad, resigned expression on his face that he always got when he was about to bail on them all. "You know that's not true."

"Tell me you're not doing this to get away."

"It's not what you think!"

Tommy's face pleaded with him to understand, but this was one time too many, and suddenly Jensen was just tired. His back was on fire, the sensation stopping abruptly where his spinal cord had been severed by shrapnel, and he leaned back against his pillows, closed his eyes.

"Jensen?"

"I'm sick of this. You want to go, fine, it's not like I'm going to stop you. You've never listened to me before, why start now? Just go, already, and let the rest of us get on with our lives."

"I...do you need me to call someone?"

"I just need you to stop doing this to me and go!"

Tommy bit his lip, gripping the rail at the foot of Jensen's hospital bed. "Okay. Okay, Jensen, you win. I'm going to go, but I'm going to come back. I'll come back next week when you're not in pain and hating yourself and the entire universe because you were in the wrong place at the wrong time. I'll come back, and we'll talk again, and maybe then you'll figure out a way to be happy for me."

Jensen didn't answer, kept his eyes closed, and by the time he opened them again, Tommy had gone. He'd half-expected to find him still there, waiting, because his brother was nothing if not stubborn, but sometimes even Tommy managed to surprise him. He'd spent the following week waiting for him to show up, submitting with increasing impatience to each test, to each treatment, until eventually they landed on an antibiotic cocktail that did the trick and then unceremoniously packed him back off to the rehab centre where he was meant to go through his 'transition' back to normal life.

He'd spent another week waiting, working on increasing the number of sit-ups and crunches he could do ―pitifully few, compared to before, but better than none, which was the number he'd started out with when he was first wounded—and deliberately didn't call Tommy because he wasn't going to be the one to call, for once. He was always the one who caved first, some kind of older-brother instinct kicking in, trying to protect Tommy and make him feel better and loved and cherished. So he'd waited, and there was no news, nothing. Not a peep, not even a missed call, not a damned text message, and eventually he figured maybe Tommy had decided to cut ties with the family once and for all, the way he'd threatened to a thousand times before and the way Jensen never truly believed he would. Never believed he'd leave him.

But Tommy had been murdered in a back alley, and all Jensen knows is that the last thing he ever said to his brother was to get the hell out of his life, and that's not something he'll ever be able to take back, to unsay, or even counteract with better, kinder words. By the time they found his body it was hard to tell how many days he'd spent there, lying in a pool of his own blood. And for the first time, Jensen knew what it was like to be really alone in the world.

* * *

Unlike Norm, Jensen never even saw so much as a pencil drawing of the lab before he left Earth, and he has no idea what to expect. The lab turns out to be a lot more crowded than he imagined it would be, filled with gleaming instruments that look, at least to Jensen's untrained eye, to be top-of-the-line. They gleam in the artificial light as they beep and chirp quietly to themselves. A good fifty percent of the lab is actually a separate room with a door labelled "Link Room" off to one side. A quick glance inside reveals rows of identical-looking psionic link units, which look to Jensen a whole lot like what the offspring of a coffin and an MRI might resemble, all impersonal-looking plastic. He doesn't get much more than a quick look, however, before he and Norm are approached by a cheerful-looking Indian man with a neatly-trimmed beard and eyes that twinkle merrily.

"You two must be our new avatar drivers. It's great that you made it! I'm Doctor Max Cullimore, but I insist that you call me Max, since we're going to be spending every single day together for the foreseeable future." He shakes Jensen's hand with even more enthusiasm than Norm did, which is quite the feat, Jensen thinks, as he returns the handshake.

"Nice to meet you."

"Norm Spellman," Norm beams at Max and pumps his hand up and down between both of his. Jensen wonders if, between the two of them, they might not get stuck in some sort of handshaking feedback loop from which they'll never escape, doomed to greet each other for all eternity, but eventually one of them must let go, because they do separate.

"You're in luck," Max tells them, turning away and fussing with a clipboard. "We've just finished unloading the amnio tanks. Do you want to take a look at your Avatars?"

"Absolutely!" Norm is practically bouncing on the balls of his feet.

Jensen saw the amnio tanks containing all the avatars before he left Earth, but his eyes widen now as he approaches the two that just got unloaded. "Damn, they got big!" he exclaims, watching the figure floating in the amniotic fluid through the thick Plexiglas.

He remembers the avatar as nothing but a large floating blue baby-like thing, its head much bigger than the rest of it, tiny hands curled into fists, the umbilical cord linking it to whatever was feeding it looking ridiculously oversized. The cord is still there, but it looks much more, well, normal-sized now. Except for the fact that the body itself is twice Jensen's size, that is.

"Why are they blue?" he asks. He's always wanted to know.

"I'm afraid I don't really have a good answer. As far as we can tell, there's no significant evolutionary reason for it. A lot of the creatures on Pandora have blue colouring of various shades, so it might have something to do with the quality of the light, or a gradual process that came from consuming the local flora, which also contains a lot of blue. Or maybe the flora is blue due to the light too. Honestly, we're still studying it."

"Huh."

"Pretty cool, aren't they?" Norm looks like a kid in a candy store. "Why don't you take a look at yours?"

Jensen nods vaguely, jerks his wheelchair around, moves into position next to the tank where his own avatar is floating. From this vantage point he can see the soles of its feet, the broad expanse of its shoulders and back, the impressive curve of its tail. The tail is a new one on him. Sure, he knew about the tail, saw it in the book he read, but the tail was nothing more than a nub the last time he saw it in embryo, as it were. He has to fight the urge to reach out and press his palm to the Plexiglas, feels his eyes open in utter astonishment when the huge figure turns slowly in the vat of amniotic fluid to face him, and he finds himself staring at his brother's sleeping face.

"It looks just like him," he murmurs.

Norm cuffs him lightly on the shoulder. "No, dumbass. _He_ ," he stresses the word lightly, "looks just like _you_. It's your avatar now, Jensen."

"Huh."

Max makes a move to pull on Jensen's wheelchair, then stops mid-air when Jensen glares at him. "Sorry," he stammers. "I thought you might want to start your first video log, get a feel for what it's like," he gestures at a table equipped with a computer, camera and built-in microphone. "I took the liberty of logging you in under your account, but you'll be able to access it from any point in the station, if you want, and remotely too, if necessary. We have a couple of field units for when we stay out overnight, and a few permanent stations outside the compound as well. Go ahead."

Jensen raises an eyebrow. "What, now? I haven't even done anything yet."

"Just give it a shot. Think of it as a practice run. Say anything you want."

"He rolls his eyes, but switches on the recording device. "Okay, uh. Testing...I feel stupid. What am I even supposed to say?" he tries to look at the camera, to keep his features schooled. "Uh, okay. So, this is Jensen Ackles, hi," he gives the camera a little wave, immediately feels stupid. "And this is going to be my video log, I guess, since I'm an avatar driver. I mean, I will be a driver. It sounds weird saying that, because it's not like it's a car or something, it's a body, and I'll just be transferring my mind, or my consciousness, or whatever. Originally it wasn't even meant to be me. The idea is every driver is attached to its own avatar so their nervous systems are in tune. Or something. Which is why they offered me this gig, because I can link with Tommy’s avatar, which was insanely expensive." He looks back over his shoulder. "Am I even doing this right?"

Max waves his hand in a 'carry-on' motion. "You're doing great!"

Norm grins at him, looking up from where he's been studying what look like incomprehensible readouts at a console. "Yeah. You just need to get in the habit of documenting everything—what you see, what you feel—it’s all part of the science. Good science starts with good observation."

Jensen snorts and turns back to the camera. "So here I am, doing _science_. Tommy would bust a gut laughing at me if he knew."

"Okay, why don't you log off for now?" Max suggests. "Come and meet your boss for the next six years."

* * *

One of the link units is beeping shrilly—or rather, the monitor next to it is beeping—when Max leads Jensen and Norm head into the link room. A moment later it whooshes open in a hiss of well-maintained hydraulics, and the first thing Jensen hears is a woman's voice, loud and harsh in the otherwise quiet room.

"Where's my goddamned cigarette?"

The voice belongs to a woman who looks to be in her mid-fifties, with wavy ginger hair that's only just beginning to turn grey in places. She's striking, Jensen thinks, and was probably a real beauty twenty years ago—is still beautiful, if he's honest with himself. Her eyes have a spark about them that suggests intelligence and quick-wittedness, although right now her face is screwed into an expression of extreme annoyance. She cranes her neck, working out the kinks of what was obviously a long session inside the link unit, her clothing wrinkled from lying in the same position for an extended period of time.

"People!" she barks, snapping her fingers. "What is wrong with this picture?"  
Jensen looks on in amusement as one of the techs hurries up like someone lit a fire under her ass and hands the woman an already-lit cigarette along with a fresh lab coat. Apparently being in one of the units does nothing to help with cravings. He wonders if the craving only hits when you wake up, or if you spend the entire time during the link itching for a smoke. It's not like he's going to find out: smoking is not one of the many vices he indulged in when he was deployed. Cigarettes are too damned expensive, and he needed every spare penny anyway.

"Grace Augustine is a legend," Norm tells him in a stage whisper, as though Jensen hasn't already been briefed on her. "She's the head of the Avatar Program, and she wrote the book—I mean literally wrote the book—on Pandoran botany."

"That's probably because she likes plants better than people." Max beams at her like she's the second coming, raises his voice in false joviality. "There she is, Cinderella back from the ball! Grace, I'd like you to meet Norm Spellman and Jen―"

Grace hops nimbly to her feet, interrupting Max. "Norm, I've heard good things about you," she says, not sparing Jensen a glance. "How's your Na'vi?"

Norm looks like a schoolboy who just got praised on the head for bringing the teacher an apple. He puts his hands together in what looks like a salute, and gabbles something in what Jensen assumes to be Na'vi. Not that he's ever heard the language before. Grace seems pleased enough, and answers in the same incomprehensible gibberish, whereupon Norm gets an expression that's halfway pleased and halfway embarrassed, and Jensen guesses that, whatever test she just gave him, he passed, but maybe with a 'B.'

Max clears his throat. "Grace, this is Jensen Ackles."

Jensen's mama brought him up to mind his manners around ladies, so he extends his hand politely. "Ma'am, it's―"

"Yeah, I know who you are," she interrupts. Jensen's beginning to think it's a habit with her. "And let me tell you something: I don't need you. I don't need you, I need your brother. You know, the PhD who trained for three years for this?"

As if Jensen doesn't know. He ignores the twisting feeling in his gut. "Yeah, well, he's dead. I know it's a big inconvenience for you all, but you'll just have to make do with me."

She glares, although he thinks he may have made her flinch just a little bit. "How much lab training have you had?"

Oh, it's going to be like that, is it? Jensen matches her look for look. "I dissected a frog once, back in high school bio."

She rolls her eyes, turns to Max, and lifts her hands in a gesture of resigned exasperation. "You see? You see? I mean, they're just pissing on us without even doing the courtesy of calling it rain. Where the hell is Selfridge?"

"I don't know that he's―"

"Well, get him down here! Tell him there's an emergency, that all his precious ore is about to spontaneously evaporate due to the release of an unknown gas, that ought to get his attention. I don't care what you tell him, just make sure he gets here!"

Three minutes later a thin little bureaucrat with a wispy moustache and shirtsleeves rolled up to his elbows strolls in, holding a golf club over one shoulder. Parker Selfridge looks like the kind of guy people like to call a 'go-getter,' Jensen thinks, all expensive suit and even more expensive hair product, with a spring in his step and a gleam in his eye.

"Grace," he says, and Jensen finds even his voice grating, high and nasal. "I'm assuming that there's a good reason I'm being dragged away from one of my best scores ever?"

Grace takes a drag off what looks like her third cigarette, not that Jensen was keeping count, then jabs the hand holding it at Selfridge's chest. "Parker, I used to think it was benign neglect, but now I see you’re _intentionally_ screwing us."

Selfridge rolls his eyes, swings his golf club onto his other shoulder in a gesture that's at once suggestive of impatience and indifference. It looks calculated, even to Jensen, and he's not exactly in the habit of analysing other people's body language.

"Grace, you know how I enjoy our talks," he says blandly, and Jensen gets the impression he's repeating her name just to get on her nerves. It looks like it's working. Unfortunately for Jensen, he's right at ground zero.

Grace's cigarette turns accusingly in his direction. "I need a research assistant, not some jarhead dropout."

Jensen glares at the side of her head, not that she notices. Fuck her and her sanctimonious bullshit.

"As far as I'm concerned, we got lucky with him," Selfridge says, the picture of cool and collected.

"What?"

"Think about it," Selfridge turns an overly-white smile in Jensen's direction, the first time he's so much as acknowledged his presence. Jensen is still sure he's only doing it to piss Grace off some more, and it takes all he has not to roll his eyes. "We were lucky your guy had a twin brother, and lucky that Private Ackles here wasn’t an oral hygienist or something, am I right? A Marine we can use. I’m assigning him to your team as security escort."

Grace snorts. "The last thing I need is another trigger-happy asshole making things hard for us."

"You know, I'm right here," Jensen starts, but Max puts a warning hand on his arm.

"I really wouldn't get in the middle of that," he says, keeping his voice low. "Just let them argue it out. It won't actually change anything about what you're doing here."  
"Isn't that the whole point of your little puppet show?" Selfridge is saying. "You walk like the big blue monkeys, you talk like the big blue monkeys, and eventually you all become one big blue monkey family, right? Pave the way for us to, well, pave the way. As far as I can tell, your song-and-dance and tree-hugging crap hasn't helped us advance worth a damn. Relations with the indigenous peoples are worse than ever."

"Maybe if you leashed your rabid bulldog―"

"Colonel Quaritch is just doing his job. It's his mandate to protect our people―"

"Protect your damned mining operation, you mean!"

"The two aren't mutually exclusive."

"Maybe if you stopped using machine guns on the Na'vi they'd be more inclined to negotiate!"

"We tried negotiating before, and look where that got us. We've offered them education and infrastructure and roads, but it turns out they really like their dirt. Just remember, Dr. Augustine," Selfridge emphasizes her title ironically, "the mining operation is the goal here. Panderium's your little miracle ore, isn't it? It's what's letting all those scientific colleagues of yours back home start the clean-up that's suppose to _save humanity_ ," Selfridge crooks the index and middle fingers of both hands in an exaggerated motion of 'air quotes' as he speaks. "More importantly, the stuff sells for twenty million a kilo, and it's what pays for your little science project, _capisce_?" he twirls the golf club in order to point it at her meaningfully. "So use what you've got, and get me some results."

"Parker, you can't―"

"Okay, that's all the time I have to waste today. This conversation is over."

And with more assurance than Jensen has seen anyone else demonstrate in the face of the formidable Grace Augustine, Selfridge turns on his heel and saunters back in the direction of his office, leaving her sputtering in his wake. With a muttered oath and one last glare in his direction, Grace stalks off the other way. Max gives Jensen a rueful smile.

"Here, tomorrow. Oh eight hundred. Try to use big words."

"Got it," Jensen manages not to roll his eyes with a superhuman effort and, not for the first time, tries to remember exactly when he made the singular error in judgement that brought him halfway across the galaxy to a place where no one really wants him anyway.

* * *

"We're sorry for your loss." Suit Number One says, and he shrugs.

"Yeah, well. So am I."

Two men in suits whose name Jensen never bothered to learn attended Tommy's funeral, the company for which they worked apparently willing to fork over enough money for them to attend, which Jensen only found all the more galling since his own parents hadn't been able to scrounge up enough funds to pay even for the travel costs to come see their son be cremated.

"The work our company does is the key to unlocking a better future for our world," Suit Number One continues, as though Jensen isn't trying to sit there and mourn his brother. "Your brother thought so, too. In fact, he was convinced of it, which is why he agreed to sign on for what is essentially an extraordinarily dangerous mission, even though he was a civilian."

Jensen's head jerks up at the term. "Civilian? I thought he was going was a scientific expedition. Who else would you send except civilians?"

Suit Number One smiles, and Jensen is reminded of nothing quite so much as a shark. He tries not to tilt his head in an attempt to see if the man has two extra rows of teeth behind the very white, very even ones he's displaying right now.

"Oh, it is a scientific expedition, but not exactly in the way you might understand these things. We've been established on Pandora for quite a few years, now: the first ships went out ten years ago, which means we've been settled there for five, with numerous trips back and forth. And, of course, we do have communication relays between here and there. It's not quite as direct as text messaging, but we find it does the trick."

Jensen scowls. "Yeah, okay. Let's pretend I'm a dumb foot soldier, and you spell it out for me?"

Suit Number One shrugs, the predatory smile fading into slightly indifference. "The vast majority of the personnel who get sent to Pandora are military. Many of them former Marines, like yourself, although in their case we generally seek out ones who are ―forgive me― physically fit. They provide security for what few civilians we have on staff: scientists, mostly, and a few administrators, because what large-scale operation has ever successfully run without a few administrators to keep the wheels turning?"

Jensen rolls his eyes to convey his opinion of paper-pushers. "So why exactly do you need me, again? I'm not a scientist, not even close, but it can't be for my military background that you want me. In case you haven't noticed, I'm pretty much broken these days. Useless." He doesn't mean to sound so bitter.

The man smiles again, and it's only slightly less creepy when he keeps his lips together. "Would you indulge me a moment? What do you know about Pandora?"

Jensen shrugs. "In a nutshell? Squat. It's a planet, it's far away, and the company has been working on some top-secret project there for God knows how long ―ten years, if what you're saying is true. There are reports of sentient life there, if the TV is to be believed on that topic, and I don't see why not. Aliens who are twice as big as us and live in sort of primitive agricultural communities. Oh, and they're blue, which no one seems to be able to decide if it's cool or really creepy."

"The company doesn't have an opinion one way or the other."

"No, of course not. So, I indulged you, now it's your turn."

"You're right, of course, about the sentient life. The biology of it all isn't my field of expertise, but life on Pandora appears to have followed two very distinct lines of evolution, which is nothing that our xenobiologists have ever seen."

"Okay, so they're weirder than the other aliens we've met. I thought our policy was to steer clear of aliens, anyway?"

"It is the policy of all the various governments of those countries capable of space travel, yes. The company has no such policy, of course. We're situated off-shore, as it were, in the legal sense."

"So you're screwing around with the aliens."

"Not as such, no." For the first time Suit Number One shows a hint of impatience, and Jensen can't help but feel a surge of pride at having ruffled the man's calm. "The company has discovered some valuable natural resources on Pandora, which makes it necessary for us to interact to a certain degree with the indigenous population. We are endeavouring, of course, to honour the spirit of governmental policies, by interfering as little as possible with their everyday lives. The best way to do this, we've discovered, is to try and integrate with them entirely."

Jensen feels his face screw up in confusion. "Okay, you lost me. My brother was a xenoanthropologist. What on earth could I possibly do to help you with whatever he was going to do? I mean, from the sound of it you wanted him to go in there and help you communicate or interact or whatever without screwing up your Prime Directive."

"I'm not being clear. The atmosphere on Pandora is entirely toxic to humans. Breathe in the air, and you'll be dead within minutes. Most of our personnel have to wear the same kind of breathing masks that we wear here on Earth, with some alterations, of course. But a few were chosen specifically to be what we call avatar drivers."

"Avatar drivers?" Jensen leans forward, intrigued in spite of himself. "As in, Avatars like those failed cloning experiments from twenty years back? The ones they told us about in our social studies classes as a cautionary tale against playing God?"

The shark-smile makes a comeback. "The very same. Except this time, we've succeeded, and then some."

Jensen feels his eyes widen, and a reluctant smile spreads over his features as he begins to understand the implications of what they're asking of him. "Tommy was going to be an avatar driver. You modified the cloned bodies so they could survive on the planet's surface, and my brother was going to be your point of contact. Like a negotiator. Am I close?"

"You, Mr. Ackles, are right on the money."

"And you want me to take his place."

"That's right. The clones are tailored specifically to the genetic makeup of the original consciousness. They won't work for anyone else, and, to be blunt, they are an astronomical expense for the company. There are fewer than a dozen Avatars in existence, not including the one currently in embryo that was designed for your brother. While you lack your brother's skill set, you do share his genetic make-up, and as such, the company is hopeful that they can recoup some of their loss if you agree to take the job."

"And why would I want to do that?"

"Let me put it to you this way: you are in a position wherein you wield more leverage now than you will probably ever wield in your entire life from here on out. The company wants you, Mr. Ackles, and they are willing to do a great deal in order to secure your services. That means that they are prepared to pay considerably more than they were originally going to pay your brother."

Jensen glances down at his legs. The way he's sitting, they look like any other pair of legs, even if they're slanted in a way that that most people wouldn't sit, and maybe they're slightly skinnier than average. Otherwise, they could be any pair of legs at all. The only difference, of course, is that they don't work, and they won't ever work again. Not without a whole lot of money to invest into medical procedures –money that he doesn't have. Even if he did have the money he'd feel obligated to send it home anyway. His parents need it more than he does.

"The signing bonus will be more than enough for the surgery," Suit Number One remarks mildly, "and the salary is excellent. There is danger pay, of course, and the company is happy to transfer the funds automatically to anyone you designate. In the event of your death —and there is a possibility of that, I will not hide it from you— then your beneficiary would receive a sizeable settlement. In short, it's to your advantage to sign on."

Jensen rubs a hand over his mouth. "I'll think about it. You got a card?"

But they both know, even as he tucks the tiny rectangle into his shirt pocket, that his decision has already been made.

* * *

Norm insists on accompanying Jensen to the commissary for supper, and waxes enthusiastic about linking with their avatars for the first time in the morning.

"I mean, it's one thing doing all the simulations, you know? I've logged, like, five hundred hours or so of link time in the last year —well, I guess it's been six years since I did that, but you know what I mean— but tomorrow, man, it's going to be the real thing, you know?"

Jensen nods. He can't bring himself to share Norm's enthusiasm, but he is kind of excited about the prospect. Maybe he'd be more enthusiastic, he thinks glumly, if his back hadn't started to hurt sometime during Selfridge's argument with Grace. He shifts a little uncomfortably in his chair and mechanically shovels his food in his mouth. At least there are constants in life, like just how shitty the food is when you're deployed—even on a different planet.

"So how did you do it? I mean, with no avatar, what did you link up with?"

"Oh, it was a 3D computer simulation. Not exactly the same, but from what they said it's close enough that it lets you acclimate when you first drive your avatar. I can't wait to get out there, see the moon up close and personal, you know? I dreamed about this for years!" Norm enthuses, and Jensen smiles, staring down at his plate. "I don't know how I'm going to sleep tonight. I'm going to be a nervous wreck!"

Jensen swallows a mouthful of tasteless green mush he thinks is meant to be beans. "You better find a way, otherwise Dr. Augustine might not let you link up. After all, it's got to be stressful on your system, right?"

Norm looks so anxious at that that Jensen immediately feels a little guilty. "You think she might do that? God, I hope not."

"I could always knock you unconscious," Jensen offers, and Norm barks out a laugh and reaches over the table to sock him on the shoulder.

"Oh my God, you really had me going there! Man, don't do that!"

Jensen chuckles. "Sorry, couldn't resist."

"Aren't you nervous at all?"

He shrugs. "Not really. I don't really know what I'm getting into, so there's no point in worrying about it until I get there, right? Besides, I figure it can't be worth getting more nervous about it than about going into combat."

That earns him a smirk. "Aren't you the big bad soldier?"

"Not anymore."

Norm's face falls. It really is like playing with a puppy. "Oh, man, I didn't —I'm sorry, I didn't mean it like..."

Jensen grins. "Dude, relax."

Norm plasters his palm over his face. "Oh, man. This is starting to feel like a slightly friendlier version of middle school. I swear, if you snap me with a wet towel or try to give me a swirly, we're going to have words."

"No swirlies, scout's honour."

"Don't think I didn't notice you said nothing about wet towel snaps. And were you ever a scout?"

"I'm a Marine, which is way better. And you gotta let me have some sort of fun, I get precious little of it as it is." Jensen gives up halfway through his tapioca pudding, and pushes his tray a few inches toward the middle of the table. He's not even hungry, and the stuff is turning his stomach.

"So... can I ask what happened?" Norm makes a vague up-and-down motion with one hand, his meaning more than obvious.

"Anti-personnel mine." It's not exactly a good memory.

"Man, I'm sorry. Couldn't they do anything?"

Jensen shrugs one shoulder. "Not on VA benefits. By the time I'm out of here, though..."

"Oh, I get it," Norm nods, but his expression is suddenly a little more guarded. "Well, the pay is pretty good, I'll give you that."

 _Judgemental fuck_ , Jensen thinks. "Yeah, I know, my brother wasn't in it for the money. Well, since nobody here appears to have noticed, I'd like to remind you that I'm not him."

"Oh, we noticed," Norm says drily.

Jensen grabs his tray. "Screw you," he says, feeling suddenly exhausted. "Screw you and screw Grace Augustine and all of you judgemental assholes. I don't have to explain myself to you. You don't know a damned thing about me."

He wheels sharply away from the table, empties his tray into a recuperation bin, and resolutely ignores Norm's calls until he's back in the hallway. Unfortunately, the problem with being in a wheelchair in a narrow corridor is that the guy with working legs is always going to have the advantage. About thirty seconds into Jensen's not-altogether-impressive exit (seriously, it's impossible to storm out of anywhere when you're in a wheelchair), Norm catches up to him, hooking a hand over the back of his chair.

"Hey, hold up!"

"Let go!" Jensen twists in his seat, winces a little as the movement proves ill-advised and tiny sparks of pain light up in his spine.

Norm immediately relinquishes his hold, raising both hands in a gesture of surrender. "Okay, sorry. Look, I didn't mean to offend you, or whatever. I thought we were getting off to a pretty good start, weren't we? Come on. We have to live with each other for the next five years, I'd hate to have you think I'm an utter asshole less than twenty-four hours after we've met."

Jensen sighs. Right now all he wants is his bed, and maybe a couple of painkillers, but he knows an olive branch when he sees one, and Norm has made a very good point. He rubs at his eyes, then jerks his head in a nod.

"Yeah, okay."

"Shake on it?"

He forces a smile, lets Norm come around and shake his hand, and tries not to wince again as the movement jolts his spine. It obviously doesn't work, because Norm gives him an odd look.

"You okay?"

"Yeah. Long day, is all."

"You look like you're in pain."

"It's fine. I just need some sleep." It's not like Norm needs him to go into the long and boring spiel of chronic pain and nerve damage. He was sort of hoping that his body would have mended itself a little more on the trip to Pandora, but it looks like they really meant it when they said nothing at all would change about him physically while he was in stasis. He wonders if this is as good as it's ever going to get, and just the thought depresses him. "I'll see you in the morning, okay?"

"Sure," Norm claps him on the shoulder, and Jensen grits his teeth. "Sleep well!"

Jensen doesn't wait to watch him leave at a trot on his stupid gangly legs. He wheels as fast as he can manage to his quarters, does a cursory job of washing his face and brushing his teeth, and then rummages in his pack for the pills he packed for just this reason. He swallows two of them dry, then eases himself onto his bed, lifts his legs onto the mattress and pulls his blanket over them. It's a comfortable bed, at least, much better than any of the ones he's had before. He laces his fingers behind his head, waiting for the painkillers to start working and trying not to think too much about what's waiting for him in the morning. Eventually he feels the muscles in his back loosen, his eyes droop shut of their own accord, and he lets himself drift to sleep.

* * *

"Yo, Hot Wheels, hold up!"

Jensen stops in the middle of the hangar he's been exploring while he has a few hours to himself, spins in place to find himself staring at a curvy young Latino woman with oversized aviator glasses, dressed in a slightly faded flight suit with the patches removed. She's grinning, one hip out at a saucy angle, her hair tied back in a tight ponytail. Good-natured ribbing is part and parcel of the military world, no sense in getting his panties in a wad over it.

"You want something, Flygirl?"

She grins wider. "I always want something. You're Jensen Ackles, right?"

"Guilty. You have the advantage of me."

She saunters over. "Airman First Class Trudy Chacon. Well, technically not anymore, but the Colonel likes to keep everything as military as possible. Keeps things nice and orderly. Chain of command works more smoothly that way."

"Colonel Quaritch?"

"The one and only. Anyone who's not a scientist reports to him, one way or another. Well, maybe some of the administration zombies reports directly to Selfridge, but the rest of us follow orders, just like the good old days."

Jensen twitches the wheels of his chair back and forth, looking around curiously at the Samson SA-2s and Scorpions he's only heard about before today. "So you fly these things?"

"You bet. I'm the best there is, so I'm the one who flies out all the scientific expeditions. I'm short a man —guy got himself bitten by something— so I'm going to need you on a door gun, since you're the only avatar driver with any kind of training with firearms. You game?"

Jensen grins. Finally, something he knows he'll be good at. "Hell, yeah."

She claps him on the shoulder. "That's the spirit. Anyway, Colonel wants to talk to you, which is why I'm here. Follow me."

He wheels himself after her as she leads him toward the Armour Bay, ducking some tilt rotors under repair, unable to keep from craning his neck in all directions to see what's being done around here like a real first-class Looky Lou. "You guys are packing some pretty heavy ordnance, here," he comments.

Yeah. That's because we're not the only things in the sky out there, and definitely not the biggest," she flashes him another wide, slightly manic grin, and he decides he likes her, a lot. "Okay, he's just down there. See you on the flight line, zero-nine, day after tomorrow if we're lucky."

"Lucky. Yeah, sure. I'll see ya, Trudy."

* * *

Jensen wheels himself slowly along the central gallery of the Armour Bay, paying special attention to the floor because this place isn't exactly designed to be wheelchair-accessible and people have left shit lying around everywhere. Tools and wires and pieces of piping. He figures that they must do a clean-up at the end of every day, but that's not exactly helping him out now. He passes by a few rows of ampsuits standing in their service racks, somehow looking a little less large and imposing when there's no one inside them to power them up and make them move. Or maybe it's the swarm of techs climbing all over the suits, loading ordinance with cranes and lifts, that make them seem less intimidating.

Someone has set up a pretty decent makeshift gym at the end of the row. It's mostly free weights, but it's clean and functional, and Jensen figures that he's going to be spending a fair amount of time here. He spots Quaritch, bench-pressing what looks to be about three times his own weight in plates. Jensen doesn't know whether to be impressed or just skip past that and wet himself right off the bat.

"This low gravity makes you soft," Quaritch says, grunting his way through the last couple of reps. No preamble, nothing. Jensen can work with that, though. This isn't the first officer who started out life as a drill sergeant that he's ever met. "You get soft, Pandora will shit you out dead with zero warning."

"Is that so, sir?"

Quaritch racks the bar and sits up, sweating but not winded, Jensen notes. "I pulled your record, Corporal. Venezuela —now that was some mean bush. Nothing like this here, though. It takes a hell of a set of brass balls, kid, to come out here like this. Especially when you don't have all your parts working right. Gotta say, I'm impressed.

Jensen shrugs, ill at ease. "I figured it was just another hellhole. Sir. What's not to love?"

Quaritch chuckles appreciatively at that and claps him on the shoulder. It's starting to be a habit with the people around here, Jensen thinks with a hint of irritation. At least Quaritch isn't being a condescending asshole about it, or treating him like he's going to break at any second. Whatever he's going to say next is interrupted by a yell from a guy Jensen thinks might be the chief mechanic.

"That servo’s in, Colonel, if you want to try it."

Quaritch nods, crosses to the suit the guy motioned to, forcing Jensen to wheel after him or get left behind. "I was in First Recon a few years ahead of you," he says over his shoulder. "Saw more than a few, let me tell you," he continues, in that tone Jensen knows all too well. Old soldiers and their no-shit-there-I-was war stories. "Two tours in Nigeria, not a scratch. I come out here... and _bam_." He points to the thick scars in his scalp. "I got myself a permanent new haircut. Oh, they could fix this if I rotated back, but you know what? I kinda like it. It's a permanent, visible reminder of what's out there. Besides, I can’t leave," he says, staring at the wall like he's seeing the whole of Pandora stretching out before him. "This is _my_ war, here."

Jensen doesn't really have anything to say to that, so he just stays where he is, hands in his lap, while Quaritch climbs into the suit's cockpit and fires it up, throwing switches in quick succession. Quaritch raises his voice to be heard over the whine of the suit’s gas-turbine spooling up.

"The avatar program is a joke. Just a bunch of limp-dicked scientists fucking around in the jungle and getting high off the plant life. But we have a unique opportunity here, you and me. It's like God just dropped you into my lap. A fully-trained Marine in an avatar body, which means you're not going to be wasting your time collecting mushrooms. You, son, could get me the intel I need, on the ground, right in the hostiles’ camp."

The whine of the turbine becomes a roaring whoosh and the whole suit begins to rumble with power. Quaritch raises one of the suits' arms, flexing the giant hand on the end, metallic fingers clanking together. "Looks good," he calls to the waiting mechanic before turning back to Jensen. "I want you to learn about these savages, Ackles. Gain their trust. Find out how we can force their cooperation. Barring that, you tell me where their soft underbelly is so we can hit ‘em hard if they don’t decide to play ball. Maybe you can keep some of my boys from going home like you. Or bagged-and-tagged."

Jensen nods. This, he can do. If he can prevent just one other poor bastard from having his life ruined, then his trip out here will have meant something other than just exploiting his brother's death for the money and trying to lick Grace Augustine's boots for the next five years.

"That sounds real good, Colonel. So —am I still with Augustine? I mean, whose orders am I following?"

"On paper you're still hers. You walk like one of her science pukes, you quack like one, but you report to me when you're done. Can you do that for me, son?"

"Sure," Jensen nods. "I can do that."

Quaritch brings the ‘suit to life. He steps forward and pivots smoothly, balancing the huge machine on one foot while bringing the arms about, smooth and graceful, in what Jensen suddenly realizes is a Wu-shu kata. Jensen barely refrains from whistling, because these things are huge and clunky and incredibly hard to manoeuvre even for basic movements. Quaritch might be an old soldier, but he's damned tough, rock-hard and determined, the epitome of self-discipline, and Jensen can't help but admire that in his superior officers. He'd admire it in anyone, frankly.

"Look, son," the Colonel says, turning back to him. "I take care of my own. You get me what I need and I’ll see you get your legs back when you rotate home. Your real legs," he stresses, then raises the suit's hand and slams down the canopy, effectively ending the conversation.

With one last salute in Jensen's direction—a move designed to show off control more than anything, Jensen figures, because superior officers never salute the rank-and-file —he moves away, huge footsteps clanging loudly against the metallic floor, and disappears from view.

* * *

Norm is waiting for Jensen right outside his quarters when he emerges in the morning. He's been up for a couple of hours already, making sure he had plenty of time to shower and eat before he has to be at the lab and go yet another ten rounds with Grace.

"I couldn't wait for breakfast, I thought I would come find you first. Aren't you excited? How are you so calm?" Norm is bouncing on his toes. In spite of himself Jensen grins, the enthusiasm contagious.

"Yeah, I guess. I mean, we'll have to see how it goes, right?"

"God, I hope I don't screw this up. I mean, I've logged about five hundred hours of simulation time, but I don't know that anything can really prepare you for the real thing, you know?" Norm wrings his hands as they make their way down the narrow hallways, and Jensen reaches up to thump him on the hip.

"Relax, Spellman. If anyone's going to screw it up, it'll be me. Anyway, you better go grab something to eat if we're going to be test-driving all day."

"What about you?"

Jensen rolls his eyes. "Spellman, it's oh eight hundred. I've been up for two hours. I've already had breakfast."

"Old army habits, huh?"

"Got it in one. Hurry it up; I'm planning on using you as a human shield if Augustine decides to test my Na'vi this morning."

Norm laughs. "Oh, don't worry. She knows you can't speak a word. I can tutor you if you want, just so you can get the basics."

Jensen tilts the wheels of his chair over the lip of the door to the lab. "Yeah, that'd be good, actually. Maybe it'll get me in her good books. Hell, I'd settle for her neutral books."

Before Norm can reply, Grace is in their faces, barking orders around her ever-present cigarette at anyone who'll listen. "All right this isn't a Sunday picnic. We've got a strict timetable to keep. You boys have breakfast yet?" Jensen nods and Norm looks sheepish enough that Grace just rolls her eyes and tosses him a protein bar. "You need to start getting up earlier in the morning, Norm, this isn't like the labs back on Earth. How much link time have you logged?"

"Five hundred and twenty hours," Norm replies promptly.

"Not bad. Get yourself set up, we're going now. How about you, Marine?"

Jensen shrugs. "I read the manual. Besides, I kick ass at _Jungle Fighter III._ "

She glares. "Did you seriously just compare driving an avatar to a video game?"

He grins unrepentantly at her. "The simulations are all just being hooked up to sensors, right? How is that different from a video game?"

"Don't be a smartass, Jensen. You and Quaritch might be thick as thieves —oh, don't look at me like that, this base is tiny, you can't fart without everyone else knowing about it— but this?" she gestures to the lab. "This is my world, and you're living in it. Just remember that."

"Yes, ma'am," Jensen doesn't bother to mask his sarcasm. He wheels himself to his assigned unit, pokes an experimental finger into the gel surface of the link bed. It yields easily to his touch, making him wonder if, when he lies down on it, it won't swallow him whole like some sort of gelatinous monster. He shrugs one shoulder, hoists himself up, legs dangling uselessly off the side of the bed, and goes stiff when Grace moves to help him. "Don't!" he snaps. "I got this."

She steps back, both hands raised in a fine-have-it-your-way gesture, and he pulls his legs up one at a time, hating how they just stay in whatever position he dropped them. He rearranges them straight in front of him, looks up to see Grace watching him with a considering expression.

"So let me get this straight. You figured you would come out here, to the most hostile environment currently known to man, not only with no training whatsoever but just recovered from a life-altering injury, and you would, what, see how it went? Play it by ear?"

He gives her a flat look. "Maybe I got tired of doctors telling me what I couldn't do."

She barks a laugh, starts hooking up electrodes to his temples, lowers the plastic barrier to lock him in place. "All right, then. Just relax, close your eyes if it helps. Let your mind go blank —that shouldn't be too hard for you."

"Why don't you kiss my―" Jensen starts, only to be interrupted as the lid slams down, plunging him into darkness.

He closes his eyes, overcome with the sudden sensation of falling, rushing through the air. He fights the urge to lash out, to try and catch himself with his hands, to lunge back toward the surface of —well, he's not sure. A moment later he hears voices calling his name, opens his eyes only to blink painfully at the bright light shining directly into them. There are two techs standing over him, faces obscured by breather gear, dressed entirely in protective white jumpsuits.

"Can you hear me, Jensen?" one of them asks, snapping latex-clad fingers next to his ear.

"Pineal response is good," the other one says, taking notes on a clipboard.

He blinks, sits up, and suddenly the techs are down near his solar plexus. He's staring at his feet, weirded out by the knowledge that they're his even though they don't look like the ones he's used to. Then he grins, wriggles his toes, feeling the muscles in his feet and legs ripple and flex, laughs breathlessly. The techs are saying something that sounds encouraging but he ignores them, pulls his legs up, bending his knees, swings them over the side of the gurney to place both feet off the ground, feeling the chill of the floor seep into his skin.

"Easy, Jensen, you're going too fast! We have some tests to run before you—hey! No!" There's a hand on his arm that he barely feels. "You have to give yourself time to adjust! No, don't get up, wait!"

He's on his feet, staggering a little because this body is huge and odd and doesn't respond the way his own does, but he's _standing_. He plants one hand against the nearest wall, stops to get his bearings, irritated by all the wires still hooked up to him, electrodes tugging at his skin. He ignores the appalled squawking of the techs and yanks the wires off, staggers again. Then suddenly he rights himself and —woah, tail. That's what that's for. It's weirder than anything else so far, trying to figure out how to move a whole extra appendage, and he comes close to knocking the techs over a couple of times and does in fact send one of the trolleys flying before he gets it all under control. Balance acquired, he looks over at Norm, who has stopped in the midst of proving he can touch all his fingers to his thumbs, grins so wide he's sure his face is going to split open and takes off at a lope through the doors and out into the sunshine.

* * *

It's more glorious than he ever let himself hope for. Whenever he bothered to think about it, Jensen never dared to think that it would be anything like walking in his own body again, too afraid of getting his heart broken if it turned out to be only a distant facsimile. This, though? This is fantastic. He bursts through the heavy doors and into the sunshine, feeling the warmth on his skin. A thousand alien fragrances assault him at once, sweet and pungent, some of them even a little unpleasant. Behind him he can hear the commotion growing louder as the techs and Norm begin to get over their initial shock and come after him.

He pushes off the ground with his toes, takes off at a jog along the ground, quickly picking up speed as his brain and muscles adjust to each other. He's still a little unsteady on his feet, but he can tell it will only be a matter of minutes before this uncertainty is a thing of the past. His hair, heavy about his shoulders, streams behind him as he runs, and he could swear he feels something like tiny electrical impulses running up every individual strand and directly into his scalp, the sensation oddly pleasurable. Up ahead he catches sight of an obstacle course like dozens of others he's trained on in the past during basic training and between missions. Then he spots the perimeter fence way off in the distance and makes a beeline for it, determined to see just how far this whole place really stretches out. Before he even gets close he finds himself bursting through a one-on-one game of hoops between two other avatars he's never met. He blurts an apology as he runs past, but they just laugh –doubtless because he's still dressed in a flimsy hospital gown while they're wearing clothes better adapted to their bodies– and wave him on with a couple of encouraging shouts.

"Jensen, wait! We're not supposed to be running yet!" Norm's voice comes from behind him.

"Screw that noise!" he calls back over his shoulder, the blood singing in his veins.

After a while it feels like his feet aren't even touching the ground. He sprints as far as he can go, until he reaches the perimeter fence, then turns around and sprints back, stops in the middle of what looks like some sort of vegetable garden, plants with huge purple fruit hanging from them growing in rows, reaching high above his head toward the sun. He digs his feet into the dirt, the rich scent of loam filling his nostrils. The world around him is brighter than he's used to, the colours more vibrant and slightly more blue-green in tint than he remembers. He can't tell if it's because of the re-breather mask humans have to wear at all times outside, or if there's something inherent to the physiognomy of Na'vi eyes that means they see the world slightly differently, but it hardly seems to matter.

"Hey, Marine!"

He turns toward the familiar sound of the voice, is startled to see what looks like a young Na'vi woman sauntering toward him, hair pulled back in the signature braid he's seen in all the pictures and vids. The woman is beautiful, if not by any conventional human standards, with a lithe, athletic body, dressed in a pair of cut-off denim shorts and a tank top that looks like it might once have been a college t-shirt, altered to better fit a much larger frame.

"Grace?"

"Who'd you expect, numbnuts?" Grace grins, then plucks one of the weird-looking purple fruit and lobs it at his head. Instinctively he catches it one-handed, bringing up his other hand to keep it from falling. "Motor control's looking good," she says approvingly. "Go on, take a bite, see what you think."

He's never tasted anything like it. The flesh is bitter at first until the sweet juice hits his tongue, flooding his mouth. "Oh my God..."

"Not bad, right?"

He laughs, juice dribbling down his chin, wipes at it with the back of his wrist. "This is awesome."

For the first time he sees something like approval on her face. "I had my doubts, kid, but you're a natural at this. Who knew video games would turn out useful? Come on. Norm's still doing some tests with the techs, but if you're up for it I'll put you through your paces on the obstacle course, see just how fast you can pick things up. You game?"

He all but leaps at her. "Hell, yeah."

"Okay. Let's get you something other than that hospital gown to wear, and we'll be in business."

The avatars are housed separately on the compound, in a building that reminds Jensen of the summer camp he and Tommy went to once when they were kids. It's built entirely of wood with wire mesh in the windows to keep out the bugs, but not much else. Inside there are rows of cots like in an army barracks, each one neatly labelled, and a small locker at the foot of each cot. He stops at the one labelled 'Ackles,' and when he flips the lid of the locker open he finds several sets out clothes already waiting for him. Grace is watching, but he doesn't let that stop him from pulling off the flimsy hospital gown right then and there and pulling on the more functional cargo pants and t-shirt. Grace looks on, arms folded over her chest, then jerks her head in his direction.

"You know how to make a braid?"

He looks up from where he's been trying to tie his boots, brushing the unaccustomed long black hair out of his way without much success. "Uh, what?"

She reaches over and carefully combs her fingers through his hair. Immediately the sensation of tiny electrical shocks runs through him again and he shudders in spite of himself. "Your tail isn't the only extra organ you have," she mocks, not unkindly. "You'd know this if you actually read the manual you claim to have read. The Na'vi all grow their hair long on purpose to protect the _tswin_. So, you got any sisters or do I have to teach you?"

He glares. "I can manage." No way does he want her touching him _there_. She grins, hands him a brush, watches as he manages a clumsy, slightly lopsided facsimile of the braid he's seen in the pictures of other Na'vi.

"It'll do for now. You'll get better with practice, same as anything else."

"Uh-huh," he says absently, holding up the queue and watching curiously as the very tips of the tendrils, protruding from the hair, undulate seemingly of their own volition.

"You play with that enough, you'll go blind. Now come on, let's see what you can do with this new body of yours."

Grace isn't as tough a task master as some of the drill sergeants Jensen has had in his time, but she doesn't exactly let him slack off, either. She keeps pace with him the entire time, daring him just by her body language to follow where she leads, to try to do better than she can. At first she leaves him in the dust, but it's hard to argue with years of military training. Jensen may not be a scientist, but he's had years of nothing but teaching his body how to do everything he wants it to, and this is no different. It doesn't take long for him to catch up, to take greater risks as he grows accustomed to how this new body feels and moves, to figure out how to use the long prehensile tail to his advantage, something he notices Grace doesn't remember to do much. By the time they're done they're both out of breath and her braid is coming undone in small wisps about her face.

"Okay," she pants, expression exhilarated. "I think you'll do just fine, physically. I'm going to go see how Norm is getting on. Why don't you go, introduce yourself around to the other drivers, and get a feel for the place? You'll probably be seeing a lot of it when we're not out in the field."

"So how many of us are there?"

"Avatar drivers? Including you, six right now. Three rotated home to Earth while you were on your way out here with Norm after their six-year contract ended."

"They didn't want to stay?"

Grace shrugs, her expression shuttered. "Let's just say the program wasn't what they were expecting or hoping for."

It's Jensen's turn to shrug. "Okay, whatever." It's not like it's surprising that scientists wouldn't have the stomach to stick it out in this place —it's dangerous as hell, so the only people usually willing to hang out in these kinds of places are grunts like him who don't have any other choice and fanatics like Grace and Quaritch.

"Lights out at seventeen hundred, to give you time to have dinner and get to bed at a decent time when your link is severed. You can always voluntarily go to sleep before that, no one will stop you, but somehow I don't think you'll be taking that option, will you, Marine?"

He grins and shakes his head. "No way."

She returns the smile, but her expression stays a little sad, which Jensen can't quite figure out. "That's what I thought. I'll catch you later."

Jensen doesn't even bother to watch her walk away before taking off at a run back toward the training ground. In all his life, he thinks, he has never come so close to flying.

* * *

 

Trudy takes them out in her Samson tilt-rotor first thing in the morning. It's not Jensen's first hay ride, but he's never gotten over the thrill of being flying, of feeling nothing but air thrumming beneath him, even if he has to use a machine to get aloft. In his more contemplative moments, what few he allows himself, he sometimes thinks he would have been better suited to the Air Force, not that he had the time or luxury to become a pilot back then: joining the Army was the quickest way to start making decent money to send back home. It's moot now, anyway. He hangs onto the Samson with one hand, holding the muzzle of his weapon clear from the chopper, and whoops with glee.

Corporal Wainfleet, whom Jensen hasn't seen since he first arrived on Pandora, is hanging off the other side of the tilt-rotor. He's the only human on this expedition aside from Trudy herself, his role apparently limited to providing security for the tilt-rotor once it's on the ground and thus more vulnerable. Grace, Jensen and Norm are all in their avatar bodies, though Jensen is amused to see that Norm is looking more than a little green in spite of the blue skin. Jensen flashes him a smile, all conversation rendered impossible over the roar of air rushing through the rotor blades.

The chopper banks in order to follow a shallow river, the rotor blades blowing up mist from the surface. Grace points off to the side where a flock of brightly-coloured bird-like things are soaring above the churning water and she yells out what Jensen assumes is the name of whatever species it is, but he can't hear her at all. The birds gronk unhappily at the intrusion, the flock veering away from them in a blur of purples and blues. Below them a herd of six-legged animals that look to Jensen's untrained eye like oddly-coloured buffalo thunder across a sandbar, kicking up mud and spray as they gallop past. All of a sudden the river drops away below them, plunging into a massive waterfall, and Jensen feels his heart plummet into his stomach as Trudy follows the rushing water into the rainbows that hang there permanently. The Samson chases its shadows over the forest canopy, threads its way beneath the trees to land in an obviously man-made clearing. A bevy of creatures bursts out of the underbrush, startled into flight by the arrival of the chopper. Jensen catches sight of a few flashes of blue, green and purple fur as the animals scurry for shelter far away from the intrusive noise and whipping of foliage.

Jensen jumps down as the rotors come to a standstill, relishing the feel of the ground beneath his feet again. Coming back to reality after being in his new body for so many hours was a hell of a shock. It had been all too easy to forget that he'd be waking up in a body that was only half-functional and he'd almost tried to get up and walk when he came out of the link bed, catching himself at the last minute before he face-planted and made a spectacle of himself. Worse still, his back started seizing up almost the moment he was back in his chair. He'd barely made it through dinner, though luckily Grace and Norm were too engrossed yammering on about nerd stuff to notice he wasn't making polite conversation. He'd simply dragged himself into his bed directly afterward, swallowed his muscle relaxants, and let himself sink into oblivion. It's a bit of a head trip thinking of that now while he's in this huge, capable body, each muscle more responsive than his old body ever was, even when he was in peak physical conditions. The Na'vi live in a world that's unforgiving of physical weakness and the avatars have been designed to be able to keep up with them if needs be.

"Okay, people, listen up!" Grace nods once to Trudy, who's still inside her pressure-sealed cabin, then turns back to him and Norm and Wainfleet, the one human who came with them. "If there's one thing Colonel Quaritch is right about, it's that the forest can be dangerous if you don't know how to handle yourself. However, shooting everything in sight is not the appropriate reaction to a perceived threat. For one thing, loud noises here attracts unwanted attention from very big, very deadly predators. So try to move quietly and keep your fingers off your triggers. That means you, Jensen."

He snorts. "Aye aye."

For another thing," she continues as though he hasn't said a word, "your bullets won't harm a significant percentage of the fauna. Just so you know. If you get separated from the group, or if at any point in the future any one of us finds ourselves having to spend the night out here, there are a couple of way stations that have been set up within a reasonable distance of the main compound. They're rudimentary, but they'll shelter you for a night without any issues. You have already been provided with the coordinates, so consider it your chance to practice your orienteering skills here in the Pandoran wilderness. It's not like Earth, so don't let yourselves be fooled. Wainfleet, you'll stay with Trudy and the ship. One idiot with a gun is enough," she mutters under her breath, but loud enough for all of them to hear. Or maybe just loud enough for the avatars, because Wainfleet doesn't so much as flinch, although he looks more than a little disgruntled at being left behind. "Let's move out!"

The light trickles through the thick canopy as Jensen and Norm follow Grace into the jungle. Jensen finds himself spending more time gawking at everything around him than strictly paying attention to where he's putting his feet. He comforts himself with the knowledge that Norm is doing just as much gawking as he is, like an overgrown blue tourist. Norm looks back, catches his eye, and they share a slightly sheepish grin. Jensen shrugs, ducks his head, makes his way through the dense underbrush, weapon at the ready until Grace pushes the muzzle down with two fingers.

"At ease, Marine," she says drily, "you're making me nervous."

Jensen rolls his eyes and steps away from her, keeping his weapon up anyway, just outside of her immediate vicinity. Although from far away the forest appeared bright and green, up close Jensen can see a whole panoply of colours, predominantly blue. Small creatures skitter away, keeping just out of sight if they can. Jensen starts as one monkey-like thing clambers nimbly up a plant he can't identify, extending more limbs than he thought possible to pull itself upward.

"So why do some of these things have six legs and not the others?" he asks.

Grace arches an eyebrow at him. "Not a bad question. As far as we can tell evolution on land happened along two completely separate paths, which is something no one had ever heard of before we came to Pandora. It's a bit of a scientific mystery for us, which is what makes it so interesting. The Na'vi, for instance, share a significant percentage of their DNA with the trees, if you can believe it."

"They're part plant?" Jensen can't mask the disbelief in his tone.

Grace snorts. "Not quite that significant a percentage."

Jensen lets her voice fade into the background as she delves further into some sort of long, technical explanation that mostly goes over his head. His brother would have lapped up every single word, he thinks. It should be Tommy out here, geeking out over the plant life and two different evolutionary ladders. He banishes the thought with a shake of his head, feeling the cat-like ears of his new body flick in response to every unknown sound, stops to look at a weird-looking shoulder-high plant shaped like a spiral while Grace and Norm busy themselves taking samples or whatever. Grace is explaining something about treating the forest with respect or some other hippy-ish sounding crap that's supposed to convince the Na'vi that they should really come out of hiding and talk to them. He pokes an experimental finger at the plant, and to his surprise it retracts with a hollow, echoing sound. The next thing he knows the whole clearing springs into motion as the first flower sets off a chain reaction in the other flowers, leaving Jensen standing there and feeling more than a little foolish.

* * *

A resounding snort slightly to his left makes him start and back up a step. He blinks, brings his weapon to bear as he finds himself staring at the business end of what looks like a very angry cross between a hammerhead shark and a blue six-legged triceratops. Or something. Maybe a rhinoceros. Whatever it is, it's really big and it looks really pissed off. It bellows at him, stomping its hooves on the ground.

"Uh, Grace?"

"Don't shoot," comes the quiet order. "You'll just piss it off!"

"It's already pissed off!" Jensen can't quite help the note of anxiety that creeps into his voice, doesn't lower his weapon.

"The hide is too thick, your bullets won't do anything except bounce off it. It's a territorial display —it's a young male, see? He's trying to assert dominance. Just stand your ground and he'll back off."

"Just stand my ground, she says," Jensen mutters under his breath. "Fine. You want to have a pissing contest?" he calls out to the —thing. "Come on! Yaaah!" he yells at the top of his lungs just as it gives an answering bellow, waves his arms and charges at it.

To his surprise, it works. It snorts and backs off, eyes rolling in its head, then gives an alarmed bleat and gallops away, joining up with a herd of identical-looking but much larger beasts. Jensen stops, heart hammering against his ribs, and lets out a triumphant whoop.

"Oh yeah, who's bad? That's right, you little bitch, run back to your momma!"

He's still breathing hard, drinking in the heady feeling of success, when he realizes that the herd hasn't budged, huge skulls lowered defensively, and are forming what looks almost like a military formation, a phalanx against a common enemy. Whatever it is they're afraid of, it's definitely not Jensen.

"It's right behind me, isn't it?" he asks softly, not expecting anyone to answer him. When he risks a glance over his shoulder he feels his blood run cold. His ears flatten themselves against his skull. "Grace?"

It's enormous. Larger even than the rhinoceros-thing from before, huge and hulking and pitch-black. This one Jensen remember from the book: Thanator, from the word for 'death,' and up close and personal he can see why they picked the name. The panther is poised beneath the gnarled roots of a tree, gathers its six powerful legs beneath it and springs over Jensen's head, ignoring him in favour of the straggler from the herd, only to be met by a wall of horns. It turns back then with a snarl, its focus solely on Jensen, who swallows hard as it hisses, baring fangs from within distendible jaws.

"So what about this one," he calls back, not taking his eyes off it. "Shoot? Run? Don't run?"

It's hard not to panic when he hears the terror in Grace's voice. "Run, definitely run!"

With a curse Jensen scrambles away, letting his rifle fall to dangle over his shoulder by its strap, sacrificing his ready-carry for speed. The Thanator isn't exactly going to be fazed by his bullets anyway. It's next to impossible to get any purchase on the wet leaves and moss underfoot, and Jensen finds himself slip-sliding his way down the closest slope, hanging onto every protruding branch and root he can get his hands on to break his fall. There’s no time to look where he’s going —it’s just a blind, headlong rush into the jungle to escape from the Thanator. He can feel the great cat's foetid breath hot on the back of his neck as he finally finds level ground and springs into a full-out sprint, dodging trees and bushes and sending startled wildlife careening away from him in an explosion of colour. His one attempt to find shelter amid the gnarled roots of one of Pandora’s huge trees comes to an abrupt end as the Thanator simply rips away the sturdy woods with a few deft slashes of its powerful claws, undeterred even when Jensen empties the magazine of his weapon into its face.

He abandons the gun, takes to his heels again only to find himself being dragged backward by his army-issue pack. For a moment he’s dangling in mid-air, held in the animal’s huge jaws, until with a frantic twist he manages to unclasp the buckles of his webgear and slips free, falling heavily to the ground. The Thanator crushes his pack with one swift crunch of its jaws and comes after him with another roar, and Jensen scrambles madly to regain his footing before it can catch him again. He crashes blindly through the underbrush, spots water up ahead and, before he can second-guess his decision, he hurls himself headlong over the edge of an overhanging rock into the churning depths of a gigantic waterfall.

* * *

"Your father and I are very disappointed," Ìla'rey’s mother stands with her arms folded across her chest in the middle of the cooking room, eyes narrowed in disapproval. "You are too old for these types of childish antics. Playing pranks on the Sky People is beneath you now."

Ìla'rey glares, resists the urge to cross his arms in a pale mimicry of his mother’s pose. "They’re destroying the forest. Why shouldn’t I disrupt them when I can?"

"You think that by frightening them and damaging their machines you will encourage them to rethink what they are doing?" she snorts. "I hoped that I had raised you to have more common sense than that. They are too obsessed with what they have found with their mining for that. We’ve tried reasoning with them, but they don’t listen. The best we can hope for is that they will tire of the difficulty of their operation before too long and depart again."

"So why shouldn’t a few well-placed arrows encourage them to leave?" he points out, reasonably enough, he thinks.

"Don’t be ridiculous, child. You know what they are like. They respond to shows of force by entrenching themselves. All you are doing is forcing them to show their horns like a herd of _angtsìk_. Is that what you want? For them to come in greater numbers to destroy the forest?"

"No, but they wouldn’t do that. Besides, how many of them could there be?"

"Ìla'rey don’t be foolish. What did we send you to their school for, if not to learn of who they are and what they might do. You said yourself that they outnumber the stars in the sky."

"But they’re far away and it takes them years to travel from their world to this. They have to put themselves in an artificial sleep to do it. They would never want to do that for so many warriors. It makes no sense to do that only to come dig rocks out of the ground here."

"The Sky People have their own reasons for doing things. We can’t know all their motivations, nor should we pretend to. They aren’t like us, they don’t think the same way. Do you understand that? We can’t hope to understand them, nor they us. It’s just the way of things. You assume too much, Ìla'rey, and that will be your undoing if you’re not careful. Assumptions lead to complacency, and complacency leads to error. You must learn to be more thoughtful, to anticipate the consequences of your actions."

"I didn’t harm anyone!" Ìla'rey protests, only to be waved down.

"But you could have! You took Tsu’tey and your friends with you and put them directly in harm’s path. What if the Sky People had shot one of your friends with one of their guns? What then? We are not immune to their bullets. You are responsible for our people’s safety, Ìla'rey! The sooner you learn to shoulder that responsibility, the better."

"I’m tired of hearing about my responsibilities," Ìla'rey rolls his eyes. "It’s all you ever talk about. Anyway, if I’m supposed to keep our people safe, then maybe it’s in our best interests to drive the Sky People away."

"Regardless, I forbid it!" his mother snaps, then immediately softens her tone. "You are going to be _tsahik_ someday, Ìla'rey, and likely sooner rather than later. I am not as young as I used to be," she reaches out to place a hand on his arm, looking up at him, eyes glittering intensely. "The transfer of power will take place before long. You are young yet, and you will have a lifetime ahead of you of holding this power in your hands. You must be ready."

"I never asked for that! You and Father are the ones who decided that for me. Why can’t I just be a hunter like the others? The _tsahik_ should be a woman, anyway. I’ve never had the gift the way you do," he complains.

"It has been ordained," his mother says sharply. "The gift is one to be developed and nurtured, you know that. If you applied yourself a little more, instead of running off whenever you are meant to be working, you would have mastered it better by now."

Ìla'rey clenches his fist. "I don’t want it!" he snarls. "You should pick someone better than me. I don’t want to be the one to take the gift from you just so that you can die," he tries not to choke on the words, turns his back on his mother. "I won’t stand here and be lectured like a child," he manages, not wanting to let her see just how upset he is.

"I will speak to you as a child so long as you insist on behaving like one. This behaviour is unworthy of you. And just where are you going?" she asks as he turns on his heel to leave.

"I am going for a walk. I’ll be back before tonight’s gathering," he says over his shoulder.

Before she can call him back he stalks off, his long stride allowing him to easily outstrip her. Ìla'rey is tall even by the standards of his own tribe, who are known for being especially tall, and it has afforded him a great deal of attention —both good and bad— over the years. He hears Tsu’tey call after him but doesn’t bother turning back. Sometimes the only way out he can find is to simply lose himself in the forest, to jump from tree to tree, from branch to branch until all his troubles are left far behind, leaving only him and the whispering of the wind among the leaves. He slings his bow over one shoulder and runs at an easy lope along the coiling branches of the trees, letting his mind go blank and his muscles take over by instinct. He runs faster and faster until the forest is a blur of greens and blues to either side, the wind sweet against his face, blowing his hair back, until he arrives at his favourite spot by the waterfall.

He drops to a seated position, chin resting in his hands, staring glumly at the churning water. Normally he would strip off his clothes and wade right into the river to stand under the smaller part of the waterfall, revelling in the shock of cold water, but today his heart isn’t in it. He simply gazes at the half-dozen rainbows created by the spray of water, resentful that someday soon he won’t be able to come here anymore, shackled to the village by the responsibilities foisted on him by his parents whether he wants them or not.

A moment later his thoughts are interrupted by the unmistakable roar of an enraged _palukulan_ high above him. He gets to his feet, cranes his neck to get a better look at the top of the waterfall just in time to see another man, clad in the odd clothing of the Sky People, go tumbling off the edge of the waterfall with a terrified yell and plunge into the swirling depths of the river. The great cat comes to a skidding halt at the cliff’s edge, roaring its displeasure. Ìla'rey scans the water for the man, only to see him break the surface a moment later, floundering wildly. He considers jumping in after him, but the man seems to right himself and strikes out on his own, swimming toward the shore downstream from where Ìla'rey is standing, with more strength and skill than Ìla'rey has ever seen any of the Dreamwalkers —those few of the Sky People who are able to take on a form resembling the Na'vi through their technology— display before. Intrigued, he jumps up into the trees, determined to follow this new adventure and see where it leads.

* * *

For several terrifying seconds that feel more like an eternity, Jensen can’t tell up from down. All around the water is churning and swirling and roaring, buffeting him about like a piece of driftwood. Then, blessedly, his foot hits the river bed and he kicks up with all his might, breaking the surface with a desperate gasp. He flails, rights himself, looks around wildly until he spots the nearest bank and begins a smooth, powerful breaststroke to get himself there, never taking his eyes off his goal. By the time he reaches the bank he’s panting from the exertion of fighting the current, his clothes and boots completely sodden and weighing him down as he drags himself onto dry land. He contemplates simply taking them off to dry, but he’s already lost all his other equipment, and the thought of being without even the simple protection of his boots makes him uneasy, alone and vulnerable in a hostile environment.

He still has his pocket knife, which is a mercy, as well as a tiny packet of waterproof matches, but that’s the extent of his equipment once he’s inventoried the contents of his remaining pockets. He stands there, dripping onto the damp ground, and wonders just how utterly screwed he is. He has no food, next to no equipment, and no idea where he is. Finally he shrugs, roots around where he is until he finds a long, thin branch that might serve both as spear and torch in a pinch. He whittles the end into a point with his knife, figures he can use his overshirt to turn it into a torch when it gets dark if he can’t find anything else to serve in a pinch.

Grace said there were waystations out here for just such an emergency, so all he has to do is find one, and he’ll get picked up in the morning. Sure, he doesn’t have the faintest idea where they are and the map he had with their locations is in his now-destroyed pack, either crushed and strewed about the jungle floor, or being digested by a Thanator which is a distinct possibility, but he thinks he has a decent idea of how the cardinal directions work on Pandora. How hard can it be to find one waystation? Hefting his makeshift spear he strikes out in the direction he’s pretty sure the base is in, walking through the underbrush with quick, uncertain steps. Now that he’s alone it’s all but impossible to ignore the sounds of the jungle —the unfamiliar screech of what might be a bird or an animal that he’s never even heard of, the crunch of foliage underfoot, the creaking of the trees that stretch hundreds of meters above his head and block out all but the smallest shafts of sunlight.

It must have been getting later than he thought when he encountered the Thanator, because before long the sun dips past the trees and below the horizon, and Jensen can see the light beginning to fade quickly. He’s found a plant that burns well and so he wraps the leaves around the end of his spear, using the plant’s own sap to make them adhere, and uses one of his matches to light it like a torch. Immediately the darkness beyond the light cast by the flame becomes even more impenetrable, but at least he’s able to better see where he’s putting his feet, rather than trying to guess which shadow is a stable bit of ground and which is a root or a leaf just waiting to make him twist an ankle.

He feels like he's walking in circles. Even if that's not the case, it doesn’t take Jensen long to figure out that he’s not going anywhere useful. Even following the river isn’t a guarantee of getting where he needs to go, since the base isn’t actually on the river. After about an hour of walking alone in the dark, though, he realizes that not knowing where the base or waystations are is the least of his problems. Out of the corner of his eye he sees a shadow dart past him, then another, followed by another. He stops, feels his ears flicking back and forth, trying to track the sound of soft panting, of padded feet landing softly on the forest floor. Whatever these things are, there’s a whole pack of them stalking him. He can hear the occasional excited yip now, reminiscent of the coyotes back home when they’re getting close to the kill.

Jensen swears under his breath as he spots one of them on a branch above him, a black, dog-like shape with shiny, chitinous skin, six legs and bright green eyes that seem to glow in the night. They might sound like coyotes, but Jensen has never heard of a coyote that can climb trees. He breaks into a run as the animal leaps at him, missing him by only a few inches, and sprints away from the barking and snarling and yipping only to run headlong into the rest of the pack, waiting for him less than a dozen yards away, their green eyes glinting in the darkness. He skids to a halt, heart hammering in his chest, then brings his torch to bear, swinging it in a wide arc.

"Come on!" he snarls, daring them to attack. "I don’t have all night!"

It doesn’t take long for him to be overrun. It’s impossible to tell how many there are, but Jensen figures there must be at least a dozen. He manages to keep them at bay with the torch for a few moments, but they soon overcome their fear of the fire and leap at him. He reverses the torch, uses the sharpened point to stab the closest animal in the chest, but its momentum wrenches the makeshift spear from his hands, sending it spiralling through the air to land well out of reach. Jensen barely has time to pull his knife before two more of the coyote-things are upon him, one sinking its teeth into his leg just above the ankle while the other goes for his throat. He jams his hand just under its jaw in a desperate bid to save his life, can feel the others closing in, when a bloodcurdling yell comes from somewhere behind him and an arrow catches the coyote thing in the throat, sending it tumbling off him.

The next thing Jensen knows a huge figure is towering above him, silhouetted menacingly by the torchlight. He catches a glimpse of blue-hued skin, gets a vague impression of raw power as the figure turns and uses what looks like a longbow to deal a crushing blow to the skull of another of the animals. Jensen takes the opportunity offered and buries his own knife up to the hilt in the neck of the creature currently biting his leg, while his mysterious saviour snaps the spine of two more with two perfectly-placed blows of his bow. In the next instant the animals retreat under the onslaught, cringing and whining and barking, while their foe growls his own threat in a language Jensen can’t understand.

He scrambles to his feet, adrenaline still making his entire body thrum. He’s about to speak when the stranger strides over to pick up the torch where it’s lying on the ground, miraculously still lit. Jensen raises a hand in warning when he realizes what the guy is about to do.

"Hey, wait, don’t–" he starts, but it’s too late. The lit end of the torch plunges into the river with a hiss of dying flame. "Great. That was my only source of light," he mutters.

The man flings the torch aside contemptuously, walks a few steps over to where one of the animals is still in its death throes, whimpering and twitching and pawing pathetically at the air. As Jensen watches, bemused, the guy kneels carefully beside it, draws a knife that’s much bigger and impressive than Jensen’s, and cleanly slits its throat, murmuring something under his breath.

"Uh…" Jensen rubs the back of his neck. As far as he knows, this is the first time in years that any of the native alien population has come within speaking distance of a human, whether in avatar form or otherwise. "I don’t know if you can understand me, or what, but, uh, thank you. You really saved my bacon, so, uh, I owe you one."

He steps forward and extends his hand, wondering as he does so if these people even know what handshakes are. He’s a little nonplussed when the guy just gets up, dusts himself off, turns on his heel and simply heads back the way he came, quickly disappearing from view.

* * *

"Hey, come on, don’t be like that," Jensen starts after him, nearly tripping over a bush in the process, reaches out to grab him by the shoulder. "I’m trying to thank you, here."

The man whirls at his touch and Jensen finds himself involuntarily taking a step backward as he’s faced with a pair of glittering golden eyes. "You don’t thank for this," comes the curt answer, in heavily-accented English.

"Uh, okay then. Sorry," Jensen stammers, staring at him, fascinated in spite of himself. He never thought an alien could be good-looking before, but this one certainly is, tall and muscled, with large eyes and finely-drawn features. Then abruptly his study of this new face is brought to a halt when its owner turns to stalk back into the forest. "Come on, where you going?"

He tries to stop the man again, only this time to find himself laid out on his ass on the ground, ears ringing like a hundred church bells going off, jaw throbbing from where the man’s bow just landed him a solid haymaker.

"You don’t thank," the man repeats, anger evident in his tone. He gestures toward the animal carcasses with his bow. "This is your fault. These did not need to die. You are the cause of this."

Jensen rubs at his jaw, shocked at the unfairness of the accusation. "Hey, they attacked me! I was just trying to get out of here. How does that make me the bad guy?"

There’s a derisive snort, and the guy prods him none too gently in the chest with the tip of his bow. "You are stupid. All Sky People are stupid. You come, make noise, don’t know what to do. You light a fire and then you are surprised when the _nantang_ attack you. You should stay in your metal buildings, not come out here. You make trouble, only."

Jensen glares. "Look, it’s not my fault some giant cat tried to eat me, okay? Besides, if you think I deserve this, that I brought it all down on myself, why did you bother saving me? Why not let your little forest buddies have me as a midnight snack?"

The man tilts his head, considering him, and a smile brushes his lips, curling them back to reveal very even, very white teeth. He’s got dimples, of all the disconcerting things. Then he shakes his head. "You want to know why I save you?"

"Yes."

The man makes a gesture Jensen interprets as a shrug. "You fight bravely. No fear. I think it not a fair fight, so I help."

"Right. Okay. So if you wanted to help, I could use it. I just need to find the closest way station so my people can come find me there later. If you can just help me get to one, I’ll be out of your hair in no time."

The man jerks his head in a clear dismissal. "You go home."

He sighs. "That’s the idea, but in case you hadn’t noticed, I’m sort of lost and you just put out my only source of light in the river. Look," he tries to make his tone more conciliatory. "We got off on the wrong foot. My name is Jensen. Jensen Ackles." He doesn’t try to extend his hand this time, figuring handshakes just aren’t part of the local culture. "Uh, this is the part where you would normally tell me your name," he prompts.

There’s a slight hesitation, then the guy says something indecipherable.

"I’m sorry, what was that?"

The guy very visibly rolls his eyes. "Your _dok-tor_ Grace said my name in your language is Jared," he says, pronouncing the ‘j’ softly, barely a brush of the tongue against his palate rather than the harsh sound Jensen is accustomed to hearing even when his own name is pronounced. "You may call me that. It is simpler for you."

He chooses to ignore the fact that the guy basically just called him stupid. "Well, it’s nice to meet you, Jared. So, it turns out I really need your help. You think you could do me one more favour? Being as how even though you just saved my life —and believe me, I’m grateful for that— you also just dropped my only light source into the river."

Jared gives him another one of those considering looks, eyes glittering in the night, and Jensen has to concentrate kind of hard not to be distracted by the sudden reappearance of his dimples when he throws back his head and laughs.

"What’s so funny?"

"You," Jared points. "You are ignorant, like a child. You do not _see_ ," he says, jabbing a finger at Jensen’s chest.

"What’s that supposed to mean?" Jensen glares, folding his arms over his chest. "Nothing wrong with my sight."

"Fire is meant for cooking, not for seeing," comes the stern response. "You must learn to see for yourself. Look."

Jared gestures outward, and when Jensen tracks the movement with his eyes he can’t quite bite back a gasp of surprise. All around them the forest has come to life and is glowing brightly: spots and swirls, entire galaxies of pulsating blue-green light illuminating everything for miles. Every shift of his feet causes the moss on the ground to pulse and shimmer under his soles. In spite of himself, he feels a smile spread over his face.

"Wow."

Jared huffs impatiently. "Sky People do not see. That’s your problem."

This is an opportunity. Jensen would have to be blind not to see it, in spite of Jared’s insistence that he’s an idiot. "Okay, so teach me to see."

"No one can teach you to see."

"Oh, please. Are you going to feed me some stupid hippy crap about only being able to see with my heart, or whatever?"

Jared looks at him as though he’s lost his mind. "You see with your eyes. Sky People don’t see because they are too busy seeing what they already think is there."

Jensen sighs. "Okay, philosophy has never really been my strong suit, so I'm going to ignore that. Look, I really need your help, here. Take me with you. Just far enough that I can get my bearings again."

Whatever Jared is about to say is forestalled, though. He looks up, obviously startled by something, and when Jensen follows his gaze he catches sight of what look like tiny white motes of pollen or seed pods or something, floating on the wind toward them. They sort of remind Jensen of when he was kid, blowing dandelion clocks and having his mother yell at him that if he insisted on spreading the damned seeds all over her lawn, he was damned well going to do all the weeding later when they grew. Then again, this is Pandora, and for all he knows they could be _flesh-eating_ seed pods from outer space.

"What are they?"

He flicks at one, only to have Jared smack his hand with an impatient hiss, clearly displeased that he tried to get rid of it. " _Atokirina_. Very pure. You don’t touch."

The spore things congregate around their heads, settle in Jensen’s hair and on his arms, where he can just barely feel them brushing against his skin. The sensation is odd, like a having a slightly electrified feather brush against him, and it raises goose bumps all over his body. He shudders, and the things lift away, float up again into the air, borne aloft on a breeze he can’t feel, disappear from view after only a few seconds.

Jared’s expression is indecipherable, but the next thing Jensen knows he’s been taken by one elbow and is being none-too-gently propelled forward.

"Come with me."

"Right, okay. Where are we going?"

"We are going to see my mother."

* * *

Whatever feelings of foreboding Jensen might have about going to see Jared’s mother end up being more than a little muted as he follows him through the forest, picking his way carefully along the path and trying to keep up at the same time. Now that he’s aware of it, it’s impossible to ignore the unearthly beauty of the rainforest all around him. The creatures of the night have adapted to their surroundings, many of them glowing with their own particular bioluminescence. He’s very proud of himself for remembering the word after several minutes of racking his brain, recalling Tommy mentioning it a few years ago while they were talking about marine life. Every time they take a step the moss beneath their feet pulses blue and green and purple, radiating outward like ripples in a pond. When Jensen lets his hand brush against the leaf on a bush light travels up through its veins with a slight shiver of movement. It’s so beautiful as to take his breath away.

Jared motions to him impatiently and so he tries to put on a burst of speed in spite of how tired he is after spending most of the day and part of the night fighting for his life. The next thing he knows, however, something has tangled around his ankles and sends him sprawling forward on his face with barely enough time to bring up his hands to break his fall. He hears an exclamation of surprise from Jared, followed by muffled thumping sounds and a chorus of yells. Jensen manages to twist onto his back in time to see what looks like a group of young hunters galloping toward him, mounted on what looks to him like armour-plated, six-legged horses. The thumping sounds, he quickly realizes, are from the horses’ hooves pounding against the mossy forest floor.

The riders pull up, which is when Jensen sees that they aren’t using any reins or halters at all. He can’t see exactly how they’re guiding their horses from his vantage point, but the animals all have long antennae the way he’s seen on many pictures of the larger mammals in the books he was given to read before coming to Pandora, and he figures that might have something to do with it.

There’s what sounds like an angry exchange of words between Jared and the leader of the group, who then raises his bow, nocking an arrow and aiming it straight at Jensen’s chest.

"Hey, woah there!" he wriggles desperately to get out of the way, though at this range he’s pretty sure it’s futile. If this guy wants him dead, then he’s going to end up pinned to the ground like a really grotesque-looking butterfly on a card. "There’s no need to be hasty. Watch where you’re pointing that thing!"

Jared barks something at the guy, who answers back in the same tones until Jared literally steps in front of Jensen, right in the guy’s line of fire. There’s another quick back-and-forth in Na'vi, during which Jared gesticulates emphatically until the new guy reluctantly puts away his bow and arrow. He does jerk his chin toward Jensen, though, who soon finds himself on the wrong end of a heavily-armed escort. If he had his gun it would be a different story, but then again shooting the natives has proved, historically, to be a really bad plan, even supposing that he'd be able to take out the whole group by himself, which would be a heck of a feat. So Jensen lets them chivvy him forward until they reach the base of the most enormous tree Jensen has ever seen. He finds himself craning his neck in a futile attempt to see to the top.

"Where are you taking me?"

Jared looks over his shoulder at him, one hand resting on one of the huge mangrove pillars that form the root system of the tree, stretching dozens of yards above the ground. "This is Home Tree. Be quiet, or Tsu'tey will make you be quiet."

Jensen goes very still as one of the other aliens tightens his hold on him. "I'm being quiet," he says to Jared. "See? Totally quiet. Got it."

They march him past the mangrove pillars until they're standing right at the heart of the huge tree. Looking up, Jensen can't help but feel a wave of dizziness as the pillars stretch up into a natural vault, like a living, phosphorescent cathedral. All around a small crowd of Na'vi is gathering, young men and women alongside elderly people and children, their expressions ranging from curious to outright hostile. He squirms, feeling more vulnerable and exposed even than when he was alone and unarmed in the rainforest. Jared reaches over and clamps a large hand on his shoulder, forces him to his knees and glares when he tries to protest.

"You wait," he says simply.

After a moment the crowd parts with a murmur. Jensen raises his head in time to see a man and a woman come forward. They're both tall, the man as tall as Jared, the woman only slightly smaller. The family resemblance is obvious, especially between the woman and Jared, and he guesses these must be his parents. He keeps his mouth shut, stays very still as the two of them circle him in opposite directions, examining him. The man speaks to Jared in Na'vi, a quick exchange of impatient-sounding words, and Jensen can't hold back any longer.

"Jared, what's happening?"

Jared's gaze flicks to him, flicks back to his father. "My father is determining whether or not to have you killed for trespassing and blasphemy."

"Uh, do I get a say in that?"

"No."

"Figures," Jensen mutters.

The woman is still circling him. She takes him by the jaw, turning his head to either side, traces a finger along his nose and forehead. He has to make an effort not to go cross-eyed trying to follow the movement of her finger.

"Your eyes are too small," she says, in an English that's even more heavily-accented than her son's. Then again, Jensen can't speak a word of her language, so that puts her a step ahead of him.

"Uh, that's because of the DNA mix, I think. I mean," he tries to clarify when she doesn't move away and looks to him to explain himself, "we have to keep something human about us so that we can transfer our consciousness into these bodies. So we look a little different than you, because you're pure Na'vi."

She snorts. "You try to be something you are not. You are unnatural. An abomination."

"Uh, Jared? You want to tell me what this is about?"

Jared's expression is inscrutable. "This is my mother, Mo'at. She is _tsahik_ , who interprets the will of Eywa. You should be more respectful. My father will heed her advice."

"Right. I would really like to, you know, not die, so I can do that. Be respectful. Can't be respectful if I'm dead, can I?" Jensen bites his tongue to prevent himself from babbling. Mo'at stares down at him, and he tries not to shudder under the intensity of her gaze.

"What are you doing here?"

"Me? I just got lost, and your son saved me. I just want to get back to my people."

She turns to Jared, asks a question in Na'vi and gets a pretty long answer, complete with lots of gesticulating. Jared's father gets in on the discussion too, but it doesn't look like they're getting anywhere. Mo'at looks back to Jensen.

"You are not like the other Dreamwalkers. What are you called?"

"My name is Jensen Ackles." Name, rank, serial number. This he can do. Jensen forces himself to keep his eyes open, to breathe, to stay calm. Stay calm, and he's going to get out of this.

"So, Jensen Ackles," she says, pronouncing the 'j' in the same strange, soft tones that Jared used to pronounce his own name, "tell me why you have come to us."

Jensen isn't sure he knows the answer to that question, even after all this time. "I don't really know. I guess I came to learn. To see something other than everything I already knew."

She snorts. "Sky People do not learn. You say you wish to be taught, but it is difficult to fill a cup that is already full."

He shrugs. "My cup's empty. You can just ask Dr. Augustine. I'm not a scientist."

"If you are not _dok-tor_ , as the other Dreamwalkers are, then what are you?"

"I don' t know anymore," he tries not to sound bitter. "I used to be a soldier. A warrior, I guess you guys would call it."

There's an angry outburst from some of the other Na'vi that Jensen can't understand, but he figures that must mean that there's a number of them who at least understand English, even if they won't speak in the language. He wonders what that's about, but doesn't have much of a chance to think it through before Mo'at speaks again.

"We have tried once before to have peaceful relations with your people. Why do they send a warrior now, if you do not intend violence?"

He grimaces. "I don't know how much you know about the science of what we do. My brother was meant to be here instead of me —he was a scientist. But he died." Out of the corner of his eye he sees Jared's head jerk toward him in surprise. "He died, and because we're the same genetically, they asked me to come in his place."

Mo'at folds her arms across her chest. "Caution would dictate that we kill you, Jensen Ackles. You are an enemy warrior in our midst."

"You're not in the habit of killing unarmed men, are you?" Jensen argues, hoping he doesn't sound as desperate as he feels. So much for staying cool under pressure. His drill sergeant would be very disappointed.

Mo'at seems to be inclined to listen to him, though, or maybe it was something Jared said to her, it's impossible for him to tell. She alleviates his doubts a moment later. "My son tells me there has been a sign, and so we will not proceed with the customary law of our people."

"Thank God," Jensen breathes. "So, uh, what are you going to do with me?"

She doesn't answer him. Instead she turns and raises her voice, speaking loudly in Na'vi. Immediately there's an outraged outburst from Jared, followed by a clamour of voices, almost as quickly silenced by a sharp order from Mo'at. Jared folds his arms mutinously across his chest and directs a glare at Jensen. Mo'at speaks again, in English this time.

"It remains to be decided. You will remain with us until we know what to do. We shall see if the Sky People can be taught after all."

"You want to teach me?"

She nods her head in assent. "The Sky People do not know how to talk with others. They do not see, they do not hear. If your cup is empty, as you say, then perhaps you will learn to see and hear for them."

"Well, that's good news, then."

Jared's father steps forward then, and his voice booms in a declaration that Jensen doesn't understand.

"What's he saying?"

Jared answers, but doesn't look at him. "My father Eytukan says that we will meet again tomorrow, when he and my mother will make their final decision. Until then, you are my responsibility. My guest."

"Your prisoner, you mean?"

Jared smiles a little. "Don't worry. I promise you will be safe for tonight. Tomorrow, we shall see."

* * *

It's a lot harder to explain the whole sleeping thing to the Na'vi than Jensen would have thought. Then again, he thinks it would be just as difficult to explain it to anyone else, even without the language barrier. After all, it's weird to think of his mind switching bodies just because he's going to sleep. He just doesn't want these people to kill him —or, rather, kill his avatar— or dump his body somewhere just because it looks like he's not in it anymore. Or whatever. It makes his head hurt just to think about the logistics of it. It's one thing to have a safe place back in the human compound to stash his avatar when he's not in it, but out here in the rainforest where he's essentially unprotected is a whole other kettle of fish.

Eventually Jared brings him to a more secluded part of Home Tree after what is probably the most awkward communal supper Jensen has ever had the misfortune of sharing with others. He has no idea how to handle the odd-looking bowls and utensils favoured by the Na'vi and quickly realizes that they have their own particular kind of table manners —not that they have tables, per se, but they still have what amounts to a pretty complex dining ritual— that he can't mimic at all. Jared rolls his eyes and shows him the basics, and isn't shy about cuffing him about the head when he does things particularly badly. It doesn't hurt —Jared is obviously being careful— but it is more than a little humiliating to be corrected like a little kid by a loincloth-wearing savage. Now Jared points to a bed laid out in a niche carved into the wood of Home Tree.

"You may sleep here. This is where the sick come to rest and heal, but no one is using it now."

Jensen lifts one shoulder in a shrug. "Voluntary quarantine. Okay, I can live with that. What's going to happen tomorrow?"

Jared makes a face that suggests he finds whatever thought he's having distasteful. "My mother thinks I should be the one to teach you our ways, as I was taught by _dok-tor_ Grace."

"I take it you're not thrilled at the idea?"

Jared shakes his head. "Not for me to decide. The _tsahik_ and the _eyktan_ decide tomorrow."

"Your parents?" Jensen asks, and Jared nods. "So does that mean you'll be the chief someday too?"

"No. I am to be _tsahik_ , like my mother. It is why she wants me to do this, to learn to teach. If I teach you how to see, then I learn to see better myself." Jared plants a hand between Jensen's shoulder blades and gives him a shove. "Sleep now. I will come fetch you when it is time."

"Pushy." Jensen nonetheless lies down on the pallet made up on the ground, surprisingly softer and more comfortable than he expected. Maybe it's because all the excitement of the day is finally catching up to him, but he can barely keep his eyes open. "I suppose it would be pointless to wish you good night."

To his surprise, Jared's mouth quirks in a small smile. "Good night, Jensen."

Jensen finds himself smiling back. Then he lets his eyes drift shut, finds himself spiralling backward into the void. He can hear someone saying his name over and over, becomes aware of a bright, harsh light that wasn't there a moment before.

"He's coming round."

"Finally," he recognizes Grace's voice, gruff with concern. "Jensen, you awake? Come on, come on back, kid, that's it..."

He blinks painfully, waits for his eyes to adjust to the artificial light shining right into his eyes. He tries to raise his head, feels a hand cupping the back of his neck, can't quite bite back a soft moan as he becomes aware of just how stiff his body is. A light flashes in his eyes, making him squint.

"Come on, Jensen. Talk to me. You all right?"

He nods, still groggy. His link bed is surrounded by a crowd of people, none of whom he can really see clearly. He feels as though he's been thoroughly beaten with a bag full of bricks, all his muscles cramped and stiffening even worse than the last time he came out of the link. He wonders if he's going to feel this way every time this happens, or if it will get better with time. Maybe it's only him —he doesn't remember any mention of this in the manuals he was given to read.

"Yeah, yeah I'm okay."

"You gave us a hell of a scare, kid," Grace says, relief evident in her tone. "When I saw you go over that waterfall, well, let's just say I've had better days. You've been linked up for hours, dug in like a damned tick. Jensen, tell me about the avatar. Is the avatar safe?"

He grins up at the blurred outline of her silhouette, haloed by the laboratory lights. "Yeah, doc, it's safe, and you're not going to believe where I am."

* * *

Much to his dismay, Jensen has to be bodily lifted out of his link bed by one of the stronger lab techs, his back seizing too badly for him to be able to get himself up on his own. He's wheeled into the infirmary and put through a battery of tests —"Just to make sure everything's okay," Grace assures him— before he's finally declared fit to leave under his own power. By then, at least the stiffness in his muscles has eased up, thanks in part to some really good muscle relaxants administered by the infirmary staff, and he's able to sit up on his own and wheel his own damned chair out of there. His whole body feels like a dead weight, as though even after only a few hours of being away from it and in his avatar form, he's forgotten what it's like to be in it. Grace insists that he come to dinner.

"You haven't eaten all day, and you need to be up and about as much as possible," she says when he protests that all he wants is to go to sleep for a while. "Trust me on this, kid, it's easy to get caught up when you're an avatar driver. You have to stay grounded in our reality, too, even if the world out there is so much bigger and brighter and more interesting."

"To you, maybe."

She crosses her arms and gives him a sceptical look. "Oh, and I suppose I just imagined you bouncing around the forest like an overgrown kid today?"

He ducks his head and grins at her, a little abashed. "I never said it was all bad."

She rolls her eyes. "Okay, tough guy. I need a cigarette, and then we're going to get something to eat."

He spots Quaritch in the mess hall, surrounded by a handful of his hand-picked soldiers. The Colonel nods curtly in his direction, meets his eye just long enough for Jensen to understand that he's going to have to report to him sooner rather than later with a full account of everything that's happened. It's a small base —everyone knows by now that he's been AWOL for more than twelve hours, lost in the Pandoran rainforest. He's already scheduled for a formal debriefing with Grace first thing in the morning.

His own small group of scientists and avatar drivers is the centre of attention throughout dinner. Jensen isn't accustomed to having so many people focused on him at once, finds himself keeping his head ducked down and mumbling his answers. Luckily for him, Grace seems to have no problems whatsoever with this much adulation, and recounts her side of events with a lot more relish than is probably healthy.

"So the next thing we know, this guy has disappeared into the brush with an angry Thanator breathing down his neck," she says, her expression gleeful. "It's funny now, but at the time I thought for sure all we were going to find were scattered bones and maybe a bit of gristle when that thing was done with him."

"So how'd you get away?" someone wants to know.

"Got lucky," Jensen mumbles, staring at his hands, folded in his lap. "I jumped into the river, swam away."

"What he's not saying," Grace interjects, "is that he threw himself off the top of the damned waterfall. I've never seen anything like it. You've given a whole new meaning to 'brass balls,' Ackles."

Jensen shrugs but smiles a little under the praise. "Yeah, well. Mostly I was lucky. And if Jared hadn't come along..."

Grace shakes her head in disbelief. "That just takes the cake. I can't believe that, of all people, the Omaticaya decided to let you into their village. They haven't had any direct contact with us in years. What on earth did you do that convinced them to even talk to you? The last time I saw Ìla'rey, the last thing he wanted to do was talk..."

"Ila―" Jensen can't wrap his mind or his tongue around the world.

"Jared," Grace clarifies. "We're really going to have to work on getting your Na'vi up to snuff if you're going to be going back. They don't have a 'j' sound in their alphabet, but that's as close a translation as I could find. What did you say to him to make him take you back to his village?"

"I don't have the slightest clue. Maybe the guy thought I was cute?" Jensen jokes lamely, only to find himself on the receiving end of a look he can't quite figure.

"Didn't know you swung that way, Marine," Grace leers, and the whole room bursts into laughter as he flushes bright red and does a terrible job of trying to stammer his way through a denial. "All right, enough!" Grace waves them down. "I think we've tortured the new guy enough for one day, especially since he's done us all a favour and stuck his foot in the door with the Na'vi for us."

Jensen buries his head in his hands, mortified beyond words. "Please can I just go to bed now?"

Grace gives him a friendly whack on the shoulder. "Sure thing. You've earned it by now, I bet. Sweet dreams, Marine," she adds suggestively, making his face heat up even more.

He beats as hasty a retreat as he can manage in his wheelchair in the narrow spaces between the tables in the mess hall, seeking refuge in his quarters. It's only when he's sure he's alone and his door locked against outside intrusion that he finally allows himself to succumb to exhaustion. He collapses still fully-clothed onto his bed, falls immediately into a deep, dreamless sleep.

* * *

"You can't ask this of me!" Ìla'rey brutally sweeps aside the skin covering the door to his father's chambers and storms in, not bothering with the formality of requesting entrance from the _eytkan_ , even though he knows it's a breach of protocol bordering on insolence and, if he were anyone else, would be severely punished.

"You wish to see me, my son?" his father asks mildly, not rising from where he is seated by the brazier in which he is burning herbs, which only serves to enrage Ìla'rey further.

"I refuse!" he yells, pacing back and forth, his long strides taking him easily across the room and back. "You cannot ask this of me, not after everything those creatures have done. I won't do it, I won't have any part of this!"

"You will do as your mother tells you," his father stirs the herbs calmly. "She is _tsahik_ , and her word is law. Besides, did you not say yourself there was a sign from Eywa?"

"There was a sign," Ìla'rey concedes, already feeling himself deflate in the face of his father's equanimity. "But it was not a sign that I should have to play nursemaid to this man. The sign only suggested that I spare his life rather than kill him on the spot. I don't see why I should have to be the one to teach him anything. They can't be taught, you know that. Why can't we just send him home? That is what he says he wants."

"Perhaps that is what will happen. No decision has been made, as you well know. But you have been given a sign that your mother believes is of great importance. Why would Eywa grant you such if she meant only for this Dreamwalker to be sent home?"

Ìla'rey shrugs. "How am I to know the will of Eywa?"

"It is your business to know," his father says sharply. "It is unbecoming for the future _tsahik_ to speak in bad faith, Ìla'rey, and even more so when it concerns the will of the Great Mother."

Ìla'rey pauses in his pacing, feeling his face heat up. "But I don't want to," he says desperately, ashamed of the whine he can hear creeping into his tone. There's just something about being in his parents' presence that brings out behaviour in him that he knows would be unbecoming even in a child of three years.

"You are too old to complain of tasks you don't want," his father says, as though reading his thoughts. "Everyone must shoulder their burden one day, sooner or later, and your burden will be greater than most."

"I still don't see why it has to be me," Ìla'rey grumbles anyway. "There are many young women better suited to be _tsahik_ in this village alone. Why can't it be one of them?"

His father scoops up a spoonful of herbs and spreads them on a slab of stones to cool. "Your mother has considered some of them, yes, and if you prove unequal to the task someone else will take your place. But she believes you can rise to the challenge, and I trust her judgement."

"What am I supposed to teach this Dreamwalker, anyway? He is a _skxawng_ , father. He does not know the first thing about life." Ìla'rey resumes his pacing.

His father nods. "I am inclined to agree. He does seem slow, but then, how well do you think any of us would fare if our situations were reversed?"

"They wouldn't be," Ìla'rey feels compelled to point out. "We have never sought to interfere in the affairs of other races."

"Be that as it may," his father says sternly, "perhaps his slowness is a strength in this case, rather than a weakness. He will be less likely to make assumptions, the way the other Dreamwalkers did. If you can teach him to see as we do, then perhaps there is hope that we can reach an understanding with the humans, achieve something more than this uneasy truce which will not last much longer."

Ìla'rey looks sharply at his father, stopping in the middle of the chamber. "Do you suspect them of something?"

I suspect all our enemies of something," Eytukan says calmly, "but the humans have increased their mining activity of late. Something is happening there that we cannot see, and having this man in our midst can help us find out what that is."

"You want me to gain his confidence, find out what the human weaknesses are."

"If the _tsahik_ decides it's not too great a risk to have him in our midst, then yes, that is precisely what I want you to do. The _tsahik_ believes Eywa has sent him for a reason. Perhaps that reason is to foster understanding between our peoples, and I truly hope that is the case. If not, as chief of the Omaticaya, it is my responsibility to make sure that we have all possible knowledge of our enemies at our disposal. Can you do that for me?"

Ìla'rey nods. "Of course, father."

"Good. We will speak of this more tomorrow, once the final decision has been reached. You may go now."

There is no arguing with the dismissal. Ìla'rey lets himself back out into the common area, wondering just how he managed to lose that particular argument so quickly and so spectacularly. Across from him he can see Tsu'tey chatting easily with a group of the younger hunters he's been training. His friend doesn't look over at all, and although Ìla'rey knows he's not deliberately ignoring him, he still feels a little slighted even so, which is ridiculous. He's beginning to think that his parents might be right when they tell him it's time to get over some of his more childish fancies. Almost as bad as his misgivings about Tsu'tey, though, is the strange feeling he gets whenever he lets himself think of the stranger _Jensen_ , whose body now lies abandoned on a makeshift pallet in an unpopulated corner of the village. What his father said made perfect sense: knowing one's enemy is the key to winning battles, and although the _eytkan_ has on numerous occasions made it clear that the best way to win a war is never to begin one at all, sometimes fighting is inevitable.

It all makes perfect sense. That's why he's surprised when he realizes that the clenching sensation he feels in his chest when he thinks about the brave-hearted Jensen is guilt.

* * *

 

"Okay, try it again," Norm says patiently. "Repeat after me: ' _Awve ultxari ohengeyä, Nawma Sa’nok lrrtok siveiy_.'"

Jensen drops his head into his hands. "You have got to be kidding me. Are you sure I can't just learn sign language or something? That's a hell of a mouthful, Norm."

They've been at this for the better part of two hours while waiting for Grace to come and set up the links for the day. Jensen doesn't know exactly how he's going to convince the Na'vi to let her and Norm into the village, but he's damned well going to try. It'll be nice to have someone there who he already knows and can translate for him. Sure, Jared speaks English, and so do several of the other Na'vi, but no one seemed particularly inclined to translate for him whenever the arguing got a little too heated.

Norm rolls his eyes. "It's a formal greeting. It's meant to be a sign of good faith on your part, to show that you're willing to meet them halfway and learn from them. Come on, try saying it."

You're not getting me to say something really stupid, right? There's a reason I never let anyone tattoo Chinese symbols on me. There's way too many guys out there with 'stupid fucking white man' tattooed on their asses for my own comfort."

"I'm not asking you to tattoo it on your ass, Jensen, just to say it to the _tsahik_ when you see her. Besides, I would never do that —it would sabotage everything we're trying to accomplish here."

"Wouldn't want that," Jensen mutters.

"Jesus," Norm throws up his hands in a gesture of impatience. "Of all the people who could have gotten this opportunity, it had to be the one guy who doesn't want it. You cannot screw this up, Jensen, you get that, right?"

"Of course I get it, I'm not stupid, contrary to what you seem to think!"

"Then stop acting like this is a goddamned inconvenience instead of the most fantastic thing ever to happen to you. I trained for three years for this, learned the language, gave up my entire life just to have the chance to set foot on this moon, knowing I probably wouldn't even get near the Na'vi―"

"What, you want a medal?"

"That's not the point!" Norm snaps. "You basically fell off the turnip truck and had this land in your lap. The least you could do is show a little gratitude and willingness to do the damned work you came here to do!"

The door to the lab opens before Jensen has the time to formulate a response and Grace strides in, cigarette dangling from her lips. "All right, kids, playtime's over. Jensen, I know you haven't had your talk with the Colonel yet, but I'm afraid there isn't going to be time for that until we get you back from the Na'vi. You sure you're up for this? No one's going to force you back in if you don't want it."

Jensen nods, pulls himself up to sit on the edge of his link bed. "I'm up for it, doc, don't you worry about me. You do realize that there is a chance —a slim one, but still— that they're going to kill me today, right? For trespassing on their land or whatever."

Grace smiles grimly. "I'm trusting you to sweet-talk your way out of that with that silver tongue of yours, Marine. Do whatever you have to, say whatever you have to, but do not let them cause harm to the avatar."

"I know, I know, they cost a fortune."

She purses her lips, takes a drag off her cigarette. "Don't be a smartass. For one, yes, they cost a fortune. More importantly, I don't want to have to ship you home in a straight jacket."

Jensen's eyes widen. "What?"

"If... something happens to you," Norm interjects quietly, "you know, while you're in your avatar body... if it dies, I mean...it doesn't always go well."

"The transition of your consciousness back into your human body is brutal if it's not done through sleep," Grace says bluntly. "We had it happen once, and the guy was a drooling mess afterward. So do me a favour and don't get yourself killed, got it?"

"Got it."

Chastened, Jensen pulls his legs one by one onto the link bed, settles himself into position, arms by his side. The techs bustle about, setting up the links for Grace and Norm, who are heading out ahead of him so that, if the Omaticaya decide to allow them into the conclave, they can arrive as quickly as possible. He waits, staring up at the sterile white ceiling, and wonders what would happen if the Na'vi have already, for reasons of their own, slit the throat of his avatar while he was here, in his own body. Would the transfer just not happen? Or would he find himself in a mind without the capacity to receive him? Would he die? He's about to open his mouth to ask the nearest tech when the lid of the link bed comes slamming down, and he forces himself not to think about any of it as he lets himself fall.

* * *

 

The closest Jensen has ever come to being on trial before this was when he had to testify during the court-martial of another Marine, some stupid ass who thought that the bars on his uniform entitled him to rape any woman he wanted to. It had been a pleasure to help drum that particular douchebag out of his unit, but it hadn't exactly given him a fondness for legal proceedings. For all that these are completely different circumstances, Jensen finds himself thinking back to that one day he spent waiting for his five-minute turn on the stand, to the gut-churning anxiety he'd felt the entire time. Today the stakes are much, much higher.

The Na'vi have refused to allow Grace and Norm access to the village, but they sent a few of the warriors to speak with them and to let them know what the verdict is, when the time comes. Jensen finds himself standing before Mo'at and Eytukan, the chief of the tribe, as Grace explained it to him. The Na'vi are separated into seven different tribes spread out all over the single continent on Pandora, each tribe split into multiple villages. The Omaticaya are the largest and most influential tribe of all, the ones who were most willing, in the beginning, to make contact with humans and participate in what Grace pretentiously calls a 'cultural exchange' and which sounds a lot to Jensen like the sort of thing that's designed to look really good on paper.

"So is this, like, a formality, or is there really a good possibility you guys are going to decapitate me and stick my head on a pole somewhere as a lesson to your enemies?" he jokes anxiously when Jared comes to fetch him. He gets a nonplussed stare in response. "Okay, really bad joke. I'm just nervous, okay?"

"Come with me," is all he gets in return.

"Yeah, I get it. No talking to the condemned. Do you guys have a Green Mile here? Okay, no, you wouldn't get that reference. Do you even have books? Like, do you read?"

Jared shrugs. "I have seen your books. We tell our stories differently."

"So you don't read."

Jared turns back to him, looking puzzled. "Why do you want to know this now? Do you not worry for yourself?"

It's Jensen's turn to shrug. "Sure, I'm worried, but there's not much I can do about it until I get there and try to talk to your parents, so in the meantime I'm just trying to take my mind off things."

As it turns out, Jensen needn't have worried too much about any of it. There's a very long and involved-sounding argument between several older-looking members of the tribe —some of whom, Jared takes the trouble to explain to him, travelled there during the night in order to participate in the deliberations, though Jensen never does get told just how they found out about him— and it all goes sailing over his head because Jared only translates a couple of the more salient points and doesn't bother with the rest.

"So should I be trying to run now?" Jensen asks quietly.

"Why?"

"If they decide to kill me, I kind of want a head start."

"They are not going to kill you. There has been a sign. They are deciding if you should stay."

"And if I stay you'd be the one showing me the ropes?"

"Be silent," Jared snaps as some of the older Na'vi turn to stare disapprovingly at him. "The elders speak."

"Right."

Finally, after what feels like an eternity of droning on and on, Mo'at stands, her robes rustling about her, and addresses Jensen. "It has been decided, Jensen Ackles, that reaching an understanding between our peoples is worth giving you a second chance. You will remain here, with us, and my son will teach you what you need to know."

Jensen shifts his weight uneasily. "Uh, no offense, your honour..." he's not sure what honorific to use, but figures it's worth a shot, "but in exchange for what? I mean, don't get me wrong, I'm really glad you're not going to kill me and all, but it seems kind of one-sided, as these things go. Don't you guys want anything in return?"

There's silence. It stretches out for minutes, until Jensen is squirming under the scrutiny, but finally Mo'at nods once. "You are correct, Jensen Ackles. We do want something, but that is not for you to know now."

"Okay, glad we got that cleared up," he mutters under his breath. "So, uh. I mean, you know I don't stay in my body the whole time, right? Like, when I go to sleep, the link gets severed. I have to go back to my people every so often, you know?"

"Arrangements will be made. If _dok-tor_ Grace wishes to come speak with us, she may do so now."

"Her and Norm are probably close by," Jensen supplies helpfully. "I'd offer to go get 'em, but I think I'd probably get lost along the way."

"They will be brought," Mo'at says. "Go with Ìla'rey, and he will show you."

"Show me what?"

But Jared is already pulling him away firmly by the elbow, and he never does get a direct answer to any of his questions.


	3. The Trojan Horse

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There is a scene of explicit het in this part (about 1/3 of the way through) for those who don't like het getting in the way of their slash. :)

**Part II –The Trojan Horse**

Jensen isn't sure what he was expecting to find. It's not like he had enough time to do more than skim the few books he was given on Pandora and the Na'vi in order not to go into the whole situation completely blind, so it's not like he's an expert, or anything. In fact, he doesn't remember giving any thought at all to what sort of lifestyle the Na'vi lead at all, except for remembering that they live in small groups scattered all over the continent. If he bothered to think about it, he figured that they probably lived like the hunter-gatherers he learned about in school, or like those Native Americans who had long houses and grew grains and whatever. So he's half-expecting to see scantily-clad women with babies strapped to their backs grinding maize in bowls, or scraping down animal hides, or doing whatever other domestic chores native women are supposed to do, while the men sharpen their spears or make arrows or do other stuff to prepare them for hunting.

Looking around now, though, he sees nothing of the sort. In fact, while the main compound was full last night and only a few minutes ago while the Omaticaya gathered to hear Mo'at's pronouncement concerning him, it's almost empty now that everyone has gone about their everyday business.

"Where did everybody go?" he asks, trotting after Jared, finding it an effort to keep up even though he thought he was in pretty good shape. Jared, however, is a good five inches taller than Jensen and impressively strong, with broad shoulders and a well-developed chest. The Na'vi are built along more slender lines than humans, something to do with the different gravity here, but even so Jensen gets the uncomfortable impression that Jared could snap his human body like a twig and probably seriously hurt him in his avatar body if he truly put his mind to it. The thought is more than a little distracting, especially when Jared turns those large eyes on him. In the light of day the gold ring is less visible, making the slightly-hazel irises more visible, and looking into them makes Jensen's mouth go dry. He remembers Grace's mocking words and swallows hard, tries very hard not to think about any of it. After all, that's not what he's here for, and he doesn't even know how the Na'vi even do... that sort of thing. It's probably not much different from what he's used to, but it's not something he should be thinking about anyway, even if Jared is incredibly beautiful by any standards –human or Na'vi.

"The children are at their lessons, they will not be out to play until later," Jared is saying over his shoulder. "Everyone else has work to do."

"Okay, so what sort of work do you do? I mean, where's everybody at?"

Jared points up. Following the movement with his eyes, Jensen starts to get an idea of just how vast this tree is. There are dwellings contained in the enormous trunk, winding their way farther up than he can even see, or at the very least chambers of some kind —it's impossible to tell what's going on inside without going in to take a closer look. He can't tell how the Na'vi even get up into those chambers, figures there must be passages within the trunk itself connecting them all, since it's obvious no one's climbing up the outside walls to clamber inside. He whistles, impressed.

"Some set-up you've got here. So what do you do? Are you a warrior?"

Jared shrugs, stopping at the entrance of what looks like it might be a chamber of sorts. "I am _taronyu_ ―hunter. I learned from when I was young." He hesitates, as though he's about to say something else, then visibly changes his mind. "You said you are warrior?"

"Yeah, that's right. I'm a soldier, though, which isn't exactly the same thing."

"What is the difference?" Jared looks honestly curious.

"Soldiers just do what they're told. Go where they're told, say what they're told. I get the feeling warriors wouldn't exactly put up with that."

Jared tilts his head, considering. "Sometimes they have to. To win a battle, sometimes there must be..." he stops, visibly searching for a word, "a leader. Someone to bring all warriors together. One warrior can win a fight, but it takes _tsampongu_ ―many warriors together— to win a battle."

"Huh." Jensen can't quite mask his surprise. "Guess we really aren't all that different."

Jared just rolls his eyes, and for a second Jensen feels incredibly stupid.

* * *

Jared spends the better part of the morning just showing Jensen around the village, making sure he gets his bearings. The structure is surprisingly complex, a strange mix of naturally-occurring root systems and tunnels right alongside obviously man-made additions (or Na'vi-made, he corrects himself) that allow for easy passage between the spacious chambers that line the inside of what Jared calls Home Tree, or _kelku'tral._ That's what it sounds like to Jensen, anyway.

"You speak no Na'vi," Jared says to him, pushing open a door made of what looks like some sort of stiff leather and showing him into what appears to be a small antechamber. Jensen can hear voices from the next room, murmuring musically together. It's not a question, but Jensen can tell Jared is expecting an explanation of some kind.

"No, there wasn't time for me to learn before I came here. I'm sort of a last-minute addition to the team."

"Explain."

So Jensen finds himself giving Jared the bare-bones outline of what happened, from his brother's death all the way to his recruitment by the Company so that Tommy's avatar could still be used. "So that's sort of why I'm here."

"You come to honour your brother."

"Something like that. It's a little bit more complicated than that, but it's a part of it, sure." Suddenly Jensen isn't sure he wants to explain that he's being paid more money than he's ever made in his entire life just to come out here and take his brother's place. He doesn't know how to begin explaining it to himself, never mind to a guy who probably doesn't even know what money is. "So what's in the next room?"

"This is where the stories are made." Jared screws up his face, as though that's not exactly what he meant to say. "With thread," he adds, as though that will somehow make it clearer.

"I don't get it," Jensen is about to say, until he follows Jared inside and finds himself surrounded by a dozen people all seated at what look like looms.

Jensen has never seen a loom before himself, so it's not like he's an expert, but these people are definitely weaving cloth in brightly-coloured patterns. He reaches out tentatively toward one, only to have it snatched away with a glare by the older woman working on it. He stammers an apology, feels a tug on his arm, turns to find a younger woman standing to one side. She holds out a bolt of blue cloth with a red design on it that he can't quite make out through the folds.

"This you may look," she says a bit shyly.

Jared gives him an encouraging nod. "You touch when finished, not before."

"Yeah, okay. Thank you," he says to the girl. "How do I say thank you?" he asks Jared. May as well start learning now.

" _Irayo._ "

" _Irayo,_ " he repeats carefully, and the girl giggles. Jared shakes his head.

"No. _Irayo_ ," he rolls the 'r' exaggeratedly. "Again."

It takes several more tries before Jensen gets the word to Jared's satisfaction, but eventually he does get it, all the while admiring the weave of the cloth in his hands. It's not like he ever paid attention to things like cloth back on earth, but around here things are different, he figures, and this is obviously important.

"What did you mean about stories before? Or did you mean cloth?" he asks, once the girl has gone back to work. She told him her name, but it's pretty much unpronounceable as far as he's concerned, like Jared's real name. Maybe in a few weeks, he consoles himself, trying not to feel like too much of an idiot.

"You ask about books. These are how we make stories. With thread and paint. Here and in...we have place for paint," Jared fumbles. "I don't know the word," he says, obviously frustrated.

"Hey, don't worry about it," Jensen claps a hand on his shoulder. "Your English is, like, a hundred times better than my Na'vi, so you're way ahead of the game here. You can show me later, and then you'll teach me the right word for it."

Jared laughs at that, bright and open, dimples showing up for the second time since Jensen first met him. "You are very strange."

Jensen grins, finding the laughter contagious in spite of himself. "Yeah, I'm a real mystery. Just ask Dr. Augustine."

* * *

By the end of the day Jensen is exhausted, his mind swirling with new information that he can't even begin to parse. He hasn't spoken with anyone apart from Jared, except for a few fleeting introductions to other Na'vi whose names he forgot almost as soon as he learned them, the new syllables too alien for him to retain. He's learned a couple of new words, at least, and with any luck he'll be able to remember them tomorrow. The Omaticaya still haven't decided where he's going to sleep, although they are all agreed it seems that he's going to need some sort of permanent lodging where his avatar can 'sleep' while he's back at the human compound. He's not sure the Na'vi fully understand the whole psychic uplink thing, but then again, he's not sure he fully understands it either. They definitely don't view it as magic or anything—as far as Jensen can tell, the Omaticaya don't believe in that sort of thing.

"But you believe in this Eywa, right?" he'd asked Jared, only to be met with a scoff.

"Eywa does not perform tricks. Eywa is..." he'd made a hand gesture that suggested he didn't have the right words for what he was trying to say.

"God, right? Eywa is like your God?"

Jared shrugged, which Jensen took to mean 'yes.' "Okay, so where I come from God makes miracles and whatever, but we don't have proof that he exists. Is that it?"

Jared shook his head. "Eywa can't be explained like that."

He'd let the matter drop after that, figuring that they could get to the bottom of the mysteries of the Na'vi faith at another point in time. By then he was ready to drop from exhaustion anyway, and had no trouble falling asleep the moment he laid down on his makeshift pallet.

Once he's awake again he's relieved to discover that he doesn't feel nearly as much like warmed-over crap as he did yesterday when he first woke up in the link bed. He blinks as the shell gets lifted away with a swoosh of hydraulics, the bright light from the fluorescent bulbs overhead threatening to blind him, then wriggles a bit, testing the muscles in his arms and back. When nothing seizes or screams in pain he feels a grin spread over his face, pushes himself upright and leans on his hands. He's the only one out of the link so far, and one of the techs glances up from where she's checking a readout on a monitor. Her name tag reads 'Sasha.'

"Dr. Augustine and Norm are going to be a while longer, I'm afraid. They went back out with Trudy to gather samples from G Sector while you were getting the five-cent tour. What was it like?" she asks, curiosity evident in her face.

"I can't even begin to describe it," he shakes his head, still grinning a little incredulously. He looks around, spots his wheelchair tucked away by the wall. "A little help here, maybe?" he jerks his head at it.

Oh, right," she blushes crimson, dashes over to wheel it toward him. "Sorry, we just kept tripping over it while we were monitoring your link. We'll have to figure out a place to keep it so that it won't be in the way but you can still get to it if you need to."

"Yeah, we should get right on that," Jensen rolls his eyes, gesturing to the rest of the room, which isn't exactly bursting with extra space. "Wouldn't want to be in the way, after all."

"Great! We'll find something, for sure. Oh, before I forget!" Sasha claps a hand to her forehead in a move that's practically a caricature, clearly oblivious to his sarcasm. "Colonel Quaritch stopped by while you were still in the link. He wants you to report to Mr. Selfridge's office as soon as you can for a debriefing. Dr. Augustine should be back by the time you're done."

He scrubs at his face with one hand, feeling the stubble of his five-o'clock shadow scrape at his palm. "Okay, got it. I hate it when they don't even give you enough time to shave. I don't smell bad, do I?"

The joke is lame, but she giggles. He tries not to let himself think she's humouring him. "No, you're fine. It's not like you do a lot of moving around in there, you know. But if you want to sneak off for a shower I can try to cover for you if you'd like. Tell them you're still in the link."

He shakes his head. "I wouldn't want to get you in trouble just over that, but thanks. I'll just go as I am."

He hoists himself off the bed, slides back awkwardly into his chair, settles onto the thin surface. It feels strange even now, having to move in a body that won't respond the way he wants it to. This is his real body, his real self, but his legs worked for a lot longer than they haven't, and now that he's had the chance to feel his avatar respond the way his body used to, well, it's just one more mind-fuck to deal with.

* * *

Selfridge's office is located on the uppermost level of the compound. It's a bit of a bitch to get to, even with the elevator going all the way up. The offices really aren't designed for wheelchair access, with good reason: no one in their right mind would come to this place unless they had four perfectly-working limbs. Jensen wonders just what the hell that says about him. Quaritch is already in the operations room, leaning one hip against a huge plexiglass console, Selfridge standing off to one side, staring out the huge bay windows, hands clasped behind his back.

"Ackles, glad you could join us," Quaritch nods in acknowledgement. "I hear you made quite the impression on the natives yesterday."

"Yes sir." Old habits die hard. "Ran into one of them by accident, but they seem to have taken a shine to me. Or something like that. So now they want me to stick around, learn from them. I think they want to study me, see what makes me tick."

Quaritch keeps nodding, obviously impressed. "Son, I wish I had ten more like you. That's what I call taking initiative. A few more men like you and we'd have this damned rock subdued in no time."

Selfridge turns away from the window, paces back toward them with slow, deliberate movements. Jensen is reminded a little bit of a Chihuahua trying to make its way around puddles in the street after a rainstorm.

"Ackles, right?" he asks, and Jensen nods. "Right, whatever. Look, you're the first foothold we've had with these blue monkeys in years. We tried before, offered them medicine and education. Hell, we offered to build them roads! But no; turns out they're really fond of their mud, or whatever. Now, I wouldn’t care, except that —here, let me show you," he steps toward the 3-D map that spreads over half of the room, presses a button, only to have the image flicker wildly. "Would someone please...?"

An assistant helpfully punches a few more buttons until the image comes back to life, and Jensen can see the guy trying not to roll his eyes at his boss' incompetence with the technology.

"Right, okay, there, stop! Jesus!" Selfridge flaps a hand at the assistant when the map scrolls right by the enormous image of Home Tree. "See right there? This is where we should be mining. There's a huge vein that runs from here to here," he pokes a stubby finger at two separate points on the map, "but they won't budge. I mean, there are thousands of trees in the damned forest, and they won't listen to reason!"

Jensen keeps his face schooled in a carefully neutral expression, though he notes Quaritch doesn't bother even with that social nicety. It's obvious what Quaritch thinks: that Selfridge is a self-important little man in a stupid monkey suit, but since he holds the purse strings they all have to make nice so that Quaritch can stay on Pandora in the long run. It's probably only a matter of time before the Colonel has Selfridge seeing things entirely his way and letting him keep doing what he wants to rather than pander to the corporation that's brought them all here. Selfridge doesn't want to get his hands dirty, that much is obvious, and Quaritch likes nothing more than to wallow down in the filth. It's a match made in heaven, Jensen thinks.

"Does Dr. Augustine know about any of this?" he asks.

"She knows what she needs to know," Quaritch says, and Jensen gets the message, loud and clear.

"She's been cock-blocking me on this from the start. Let me tell you something, Ackles," Selfrige says, puffing out his chest like a tropical bird showing off its feathers, "she might be all holier-than-thou about this and think her science is somehow above petty concerns like money, but it's the money that's keeping her little three-ring circus going. So she gets on her high horse one too many times, it will be my absolute pleasure to knock her out of her saddle and send the bitch packing back to earth if it suits me."

"So you want me to talk the Na'vi into moving out?"

"That's about the size of it. You think you can do that, son?" Quaritch gazes at him, blue eyes glittering intensely.

"No idea, sir. I barely got there. But I can try."

"Can't ask for more than that. Truth be told, I don't think you'll be able to, but that's because better negotiators than you have tried and failed. What I want from you, Ackles, is information. You're getting a look where no human has ever been before, right in the heart of enemy territory. So you're going to scout for me. I want to know everything there is to know about these people: what their living arrangements are like, what their defences are. I want to know what they have for breakfast and what sort of weapons they use, how many weapons they have and just how good they are at using 'em. You understand me?"

Jensen has to make an effort not to chew on his lip. "I understand, sir. You want a tactical evaluation of the site."

Quaritch grins, but the smile doesn't reach his eyes. "Knew you were quick on the uptake. These savages won't play ball? That means we're going to have to get down in it, and sooner more likely than later. So when that time comes, I want to know exactly where I need to lean to exact the most leverage. I want them by the short and curlies, you hear me?"

"I hear you, sir."

"Look, kid," Selfridge breaks in, "Killing the indigenous looks bad, but there’s one thing shareholders hate more than bad press—and that’s a bad quarterly statement. Not to mention I got some very large, very important government contracts to uphold. There are bigger issues at stake than a village full of tree-hugging savages. We can find them a different tree, hell, we'll build them a new tree, so long as it means all the shipping runs leave for earth right on schedule. So you find me a carrot to get them to move, or it’s going to have to be _all stick_."

After that, there's really nothing else to say.

* * *

Jensen drags himself out of bed the next morning several hours before he's due to go back into the link. He's due to meet Norm for another tutoring session, since Grace figures the more Na'vi he learns on his own the easier it'll be. At this rate, he thinks, he's going to exhaust himself unless he can find some other way to catch up on his sleep. He wheels himself out of his room, shoulders aching a little from the strain. Somehow his body has grown disused to even the most rudimentary of motions after only a couple of days of being linked up to the avatar. Quaritch was right, he thinks, Pandora does make you soft. He's going to have to start making time to go to the gym and make sure he doesn't get too badly out of shape while he's here. After all, what's the use of going home and getting his legs back in a few years if his body is too weak to hold him up? Or if he's just grown too flabby and soft to make proper use of it? He's seen his share of retired soldiers, pot-bellied and resigned to their fates, like old horses too tired and lame to canter anymore, and he'll be damned if he lets that happen to him.

To his surprise, he finds Grace waiting for him in the laboratory. "Grab a seat, Jensen," she motions to the table.

"Way ahead of you," he rolls his eyes, and notes with some satisfaction that she looks a little embarrassed at her own slip-up. "Where's Norm?"

"Reassigned for today. I have him packing up equipment in the next room. He's got more familiarity with how things work than you, and we're going to be shipping out in a couple of days, four tops."

He pulls up by the table, locks the wheels on his chair, can't quite hide his expression of surprise. "Really? All of us?"

"No, just you, me, Norm and a couple of techs. I've got Selfridge breathing down my neck and I hate being micromanaged, especially during a culturally sensitive mission like this one. No offense, but I don't need them filling your head with corporate bullshit and trying to direct this like it's a bad 3D movie."

Jensen snorts. "Well, thanks for the vote of confidence. Last time I checked, I was still my own man."

Grace just shrugs. "None of us are completely immune to outside influence. It's what makes us human. Besides, I think you'll like it up there. We're going to a base in the Hallelujah Mountains."

In spite of himself, he feels a thrill travel up his spine. "The floating mountains?"

It's the only thing he really knows about Pandora, from an educational vid he and Tommy watched when they were still in high school. It's what got Tommy all excited about space travel and xenobiology to begin with.

She grins, and it takes ten years off her face. She looks, well, a lot like her avatar. Young and enthusiastic and really pretty, too. "The very same. We have a little set-up there. Nothing as comprehensive as what we have here, but there are enough link beds for all of us and a few to spare, and it'll let us all work without distractions."

"Human distractions, anyway," Jensen murmurs, thinking of Jared.

"I have to be honest, Jensen," Grace says, lighting up a cigarette and watching him as she blows a plume of smoke to the side, "I'm not thrilled at the idea that we're sending you in alone there. You're inexperienced except for earthside combat, which I have no doubt you excel at. Except this is neither earth nor combat, and I kind of feel like we're feeding you to the wolves, here."

"Don't worry about me, Doc, I can handle myself."

"I know, and that's part of what worries me. Even though they look a lot like us, the Na'vi aren't human in any way, shape, or form. Their brains are literally wired differently, and while there are similarities, we can't let ourselves fall into the trap of thinking that we have the same motivations. There are things about them we're never going to understand, because it's physically impossible, even for us avatar drivers. Do you get that?"

He shrugs. "Honestly? No. You're kind of speaking gibberish. But then, that's kind of been my entire world for the past week or so, so I'm getting used to it."

She barks a laugh, takes another drag off her cigarette, taps the ash into a tray by her computer pad. "Maybe you're not the worst choice after all. Okay. Enough with the aliens-aren't-people pep talk. I'm going to grill you on your basics, make sure you don't make a total idiot of yourself. Did you make a video log of your experiences yesterday?"

He shakes his head a little sheepishly. "No, sorry. I was too goddamned wiped out to do anything except go back to my bunk and lapse into a coma."

"It's important that you record something every day, Jensen," she jabs her cigarette at him for emphasis. "You are our pipeline into these people's minds. Everything you see, every piece of knowledge you bring back, is going to help us understand them, and this whole moon, for that matter." She leans forward, one hand resting on the arm holding her cigarette. "There's something big happening here, Jensen, something bigger than anything we've ever seen before in all of human history, and I think you might be the guy to help us unlock it."

Jensen blinks. "But no pressure, or anything."

She laughs again. "Yeah, no pressure."

* * *

"Okay, I think this is working," Jensen fiddles a bit with the video feed, checks the screen to make sure the focus is on his face and doesn't make him look too stupid. "I'm supposed to be making a log of what happened yesterday, but I just realized I've been here for, like, over a week and I never sent word back to you guys. They explained it to me here, that I can send you messages and they'll go through the relays and only take, like, maybe a week to get to you. So I set up an account for you —well, Shirley in administration set up an account for me and I put your names on it, so you can send me messages anytime and they'll be charged to my account.

"So, uh, hi Mom, hi Dad, it's me. I know, I look good for having been gone six years, right? You don't really age in cryo, I guess... Anyway, I checked the records and it looks like you guys got all the back-pay I was owed, so that's good. Well, I guess it wasn't back-pay since you were getting it while I was asleep, but it feels like back-pay to me, you know? Uh, yeah. So, that's good. I hope prices haven't gone up too much, I couldn't keep track of things while I was under, but I want you to send word if you need anything, or if anything happens, okay?

"Grace, that's my boss, she's saying we're going to be heading up to a base in the Hallelujah Mountains –you remember them from the vid that Tommy used to watch all the time when we were kids? It's pretty far, but I'll still have access to my mail there, I think. If not, I'll get one of the guys to monitor my mail here for emergencies, just in case.

"Okay, so I think that's enough random crap for one message. I just wanted to get that out of the way so you wouldn't worry. I, uh," Jensen clears his throat a little, "I just want you to know that I miss you, and I wish that it was Tommy here the way it was supposed to be. He'd be telling you all about how awesome this place is. It really is, too. It's huge, for one. Everything back on earth seems so tiny compared to this. You guys would love it, there are just... trees, everywhere. Like, huge trees. Hundreds of feet tall, like taller than those sequoias you read about in history books and everything. Everything is big and green and fresh, like walking inside a greenhouse all the time, except, like, a hundred times as big.

"The good news in all this, actually, is that I'm pretty good at this whole avatar driving business. I can't tell you much about what I'm doing because I had to sign all these forms that said I wasn't allowed, but I think it's okay for me to tell you that I met with the aliens who live here. Well, I guess technically I'm the alien, but whatever. I'm going to be spending a lot of time with them, especially this one guy whose name I can't pronounce, but he said I can call him Jared. I think you'd like him, Mom, he kind of reminds me of...well, he doesn't take any shit from me and he's, I don't know. I don't get his sense of humour and he doesn't get mine, but I think that's because he doesn't speak very good English and I don't speak a damn word of Na'vi. We're working on that, though. I figure if I work hard enough at it I might be able to string a couple of words together by the time we're done, and his English is already pretty decent so it won't take much before he's speaking it better than I do.

"Anyway, I'm going to have to go soon, because Jared is waiting for me, back at the village, and I have to go do a whole bunch of complicated technical stuff to link up with my avatar, but I'm going to try to make sure I don't disappear or anything. I know how much you guys hate that. Worst comes to worst I'll record the messages while I'm up there and then send them when we come back here to resupply or something. Or, more likely I'll give them to someone to send when they come back. Somehow, I don't think Grace will be letting me come back here unsupervised too much, although I guess if they order me back she won't have much say in it. Sorry, I shouldn't even be talking about that, I guess. It's just backstage politics; you know how it is, right? It turns out that you get that everywhere you go around here.

"Everyone is pretty excitable around these parts, and that includes Grace and Selfridge. Selfridge is the guy who runs the place, but he's pretty much a stuffed suit like the rest of them, with no idea what's going on outside. All he's interested in is this ore that we've been mining out of here. You probably heard about it on the news back home, I know it was already starting to make headlines back when I was just about to leave. Is it really doing all the fantastic stuff they said it was going to do? It's been six years," Jensen rubs the back of his neck, "and I guess a lot can happen in that time. For all I know, people in the cities don't even need rebreather masks anymore, but I'm guessing that's way too optimistic even for me.

"I think you guys would get a kick out of the name the guys here have given to the ore, which all the serious people call Panderium. That's the official name for it, but the miners and the other soldiers —most of 'em ex-Marines like me— they all call it 'Unobtainium' because apparently it's a real bitch to get it out of the ground. I've seen one of the mining sites, real quick because we were just flying above it on our way somewhere else, and it looks like a war zone down there. All the trees, all the plants, everything is gone. It's..." Jensen stumbles over his words, remembering looking down on the devastation like an open wound in the moon's flank. "It actually looks pretty horrible. Like we transplanted part of our own planet right into this place which is crammed full of life. But I guess a few square miles of trees here is worth saving a whole planet, right?

He glances back over his shoulder. "Okay, I really gotta go, that's my call. I love you, and I'll talk to you again as soon as I can manage it. Let me know if you need anything. I've arranged for most of my paycheck to get directly deposited into your account —it's not like I have anywhere to spend it while I'm here anyway, so hopefully you'll be able to hang in there until I get back. It's going to be a while, but we'll be fine, I know it. Love you."

Jensen swallows a sudden lump in his throat, reaches over and switches off the monitor. He didn't feel the last six years go by, but suddenly the next five ones are looming overhead, long and vaguely menacing, and it occurs to him that even if he left tomorrow, it would still be another six years before he saw his parents again.

"Shit," he shakes his head, wheels determinedly back toward the link room.

* * *

Jared is waiting by his bedside when he opens his eyes. "You were asleep a very long time," he says a little accusingly. He's crouched on his heels, forearms resting easily on his knees, hands dangling between his legs, the very picture of relaxed ease.

"Sorry, I didn't realize you'd be waiting for me at the ass-crack of dawn," Jensen grumbles, uncurling himself from his bed. Apparently he's not a morning person even in avatar form, either. "Is the sun even up?"

"Yes," Jared answers the sarcastic question without batting an eye, and Jensen wonders if sarcasm just isn't a Na'vi trait, or if it's something specifically about Jared that makes him not get sarcasm, or whether Jared's just screwing with his mind. It could be any of the above, frankly.

Jensen gets to his feet, works out the kinks in his spine, scrunches his toes against the ground, still can't help the goofy grin that spreads across his face when he's able to move every single joint in his legs, feel the ground under the soles of his feet. He still can't get over it, isn't sure he ever will. Jared gives him a curious look, but says nothing.

"Today we will ride the _pa'li_ ," Jared says instead of whatever is obviously on his mind.

"The what?"

Jared looks a little exasperated at already getting off to a bad start.

"I will show you, and you will learn."

"That's the general idea, yeah," Jensen narrows his eyes. "Do we get to eat first?" he asks, as his stomach gives a sudden rumble. He may have had breakfast, but his avatar hasn't. Jared laughs.

"Tomorrow you come earlier. We eat with the sun, and it is already much..." he fumbles for his words.

"You mean I'm too late for breakfast?" Jensen supplies, and Jared smiles.

"It is late," he agrees, "but there is food."

Food turns out to be a sort of flatbread, a little dry but savoury, as though it's been baked with herbs or something, and Jared gives him a small container of a kind of brown paste to spread over it along with some sort of fruit nectar to drink. The Na'vi don't go much for utensils as far as Jensen can tell, although they do have bowls of every shape and size to go with their food. Each one, Jared explains as they go, serves a different purpose. The flat bread serves to scoop up a lot of the different foods, and Jensen gets his hand smacked a couple of times before he gets the hang of the table manners.

"Do all the Na'vi eat this way?" he asks, and gets a headshake in return.

"Omaticaya have different customs from the People of the Plains. All the tribes are different, though in many ways we are the same" he explains, carefully scooping paste onto a piece of bread and snacking on it while Jensen has his own breakfast. Jensen finds himself watching his hands, fascinated by the slender fingers, calloused at the tips and in patches from years spent perfecting the art of bow hunting. Jared's hands are beautiful, unscarred, although Jensen has seen scars on the hands of many of the other Na'vi in the village. He wonders if that means Jared hasn't been out hunting as much, or if he's just that much better than everyone else at what he does. "It is the same in some ways, different in others," Jared is saying, snapping him back to the present. "The People of the Plains make...flat bowls?" he turns it into a question.

"Plates?" Jensen suggests, and gets a nod.

"Plates. They eat with knives," he adds, making a face that suggests he finds the practice mildly distasteful.

"What's wrong with that?"

"Food should be cut before, not during eating."

Jensen tilts his head, considering. "Yeah, okay. Humans eat with knives, too. We don't see anything wrong with cutting our food while it's on our plates."

"You also eat things in pouches," Jared points out, as though that settles any argument about it, and Jensen has to concede his point. MREs are disgusting no matter how you put it.

"Only when we absolutely have to," he grins, popping the rest of the bread and paste into his mouth and washing it down with the last of his juice. He dusts off his hands. "So...what do I do with this?"

He gestures to the small bowl which contained the paste, and Jared patiently takes him through the motions of washing it out with a stiff-bristled brush and a kind of pasty soap mixed in with something granular like sand, though Jensen hasn't seen anything like sand anywhere in the forest, so he figures it must be something different. The word that Jared gives him to describe it could be anything as far as he can tell, like 'soap' or 'mud' or 'flying zebras' because he wouldn't put it above Jared to mess with his head a little bit when it comes to things like this.

"Come, Jensen. I show you the _pa'li_."

Jensen trots after him, looking around and still feeling like a damned gawking tourist as he tries to take it all in all at once. There's a flurry of movement off to one side, and all of a sudden he nearly trips over a tiny Na'vi kid, a girl by the looks of it, who has brazenly planted herself directly in his path.

Well, hi there," he looks down at her determined-looking expression. "Aren't you meant to be in school or whatever?"

She clearly has no idea what he's saying, glances to one side where he suddenly catches sight of a small group of children, all obviously urging her on. She puts out a hand, manages to just barely poke him in the hip, then dashes off at top speed amidst squeals of delighted horror from her friends. Jensen rolls his eyes.

"Great. I'm the town freak, apparently."

Jared is grinning back at him. "They are children. They are curious about the Dreamwalkers. They think you are not real."

"Oh, I'm plenty real. I don't suppose the Omaticaya believe in spanking?"

Jared gives him a puzzled look. "I don't know this word."

"It's a punishment for human children. When they misbehave, we give their bums a swat," Jensen swings one hand in demonstration, which provokes an incredulous laugh.

"Yes, but not when they are so old. Only... babies?"

"Toddlers. When they're still small but already walk?"

"Yes," Jared thinks about it for a moment before replying. "When they are older, such punishment is not... not considered right."

"So how do you punish your teenagers?"

"They are made to help with work, with tasks they do not usually do. It helps for learning. This way, come."

He leads Jensen down along the beautifully-carved passageways of the enormous tree, which lead to the ground in an elaborate spiral. There aren't any steps carved into the wood the way Jensen might have expected, but otherwise it feels like any other human gallery in a large building back on earth.

"I've never seen anything like this," he says, trying to keep his footing on the smooth surface while still watching Jared and yet trying to crane his neck to see up as far as possible. "Did you do this, or do the trees do it naturally? I mean, this is a huge tree, even by your standards. The trees back where I come from aren't like this at all. Not that I know of, anyway. You can't live in the trees on our world —what's left of them, anyway. They're too small, and I think their, uh, physiology or whatever, isn't right for it."

Jared doesn't turn back, but Jensen gets the impression he doesn't quite know how to begin answering the barrage of questions Jensen just launched at him. "We don't make the trees, but Home Tree is not like this when we find it. Our ancestors made Home Tree so that we could live here. You see the stories on the walls," he points to the pictograms that Jensen's been trying to read, except that every time he stops paying attention to his feet he either slips or trips and has to catch himself in order not to fall. "There is no time now, but we come back, and you may see the stories."

"Okay, yeah, I'd like that. You think there's any chance I could take pictures or something? Like, bring a camera? Dr. Augustine would give her eye teeth to be able to document all of this, I'll bet."

Jared shrugs, as though it's of no importance to him one way or another. "I will ask my mother, but I think maybe not yet."

"Yeah." Jensen suddenly gets the impression that this might be a whole lot trickier than he first thought. "You guys don't have problems with cameras, do you? I mean, when they first got invented on Earth there were people who, like, thought that getting your picture taken would steal your soul, but that's totally not true."

Jared stops so abruptly that Jensen practically breaks his nose on his shoulder blade. He turns, expression scornful. "A soul cannot be stolen here, Jensen. They belong to Eywa, and you cannot steal what is hers. It always returns."

Jensen winces. "Sorry."

Jared just takes him by the arm, leads him out into the forest and into a nearby clearing. "Here," he says. He puts two fingers to his lips, gives a piercing whistle. Almost immediately two of the hexapedal mounts that Jensen saw Tsu'tey and the other warriors riding a couple of days before come trotting slowly into view. Direhorses, he remembers. Jared nudges his shoulder. "Today, you ride."

"Super," Jensen mutters.

* * *

The direhorses are just as big as Jensen remembers, though slightly less intimidating in the clear light of day. Their heads are strangely-shaped, reminding him more of ornately-carved chess pieces than of real horses, except that their eyes roll a little wildly as they come near, and one of them gives a fearful snort and stamps its hooves, backing up as it gets a nose-full of his scent.

"I don't think he likes me much," he says to Jared.

"A'lai is female. And she does not like you much, it is true. That is because she can smell that you are unnatural," Jared assures him blithely.

"Oh, that totally makes me feel better. What the hell am I supposed to do with that?"

"You ride," Jared says, like it's the most obvious thing in the world.

"Right. Naturally. Uh, I've never ridden a horse in my life."

"I teach you. _P'ali_ are not dangerous. The Omaticaya learn to ride when we are very small children. You will ride A'lai, because she is old and gentle. Stand to her side, and put your hand like this," Jared nudges him forward, moves Jensen's left hand to rest on the direhorse's neck, his right against her flank. "Then you mount."

Jensen's seen enough cowboy movies in his time that he at least knows the basics of how to mount a horse. He figures a direhorse can't be all that different, so he gives himself a bit of momentum and swings up onto the direhorse's back, although it turns into one of his clumsier attempts at anything in his life. He kind of feels like he's trying to shimmy his way up a haystack, ends up sprawled halfway across the direhorse's back before he finally rights himself. At least he's still facing the right way, he consoles himself once he's upright. Jared is grinning up at him, not bothering to hide just how damned amusing he finds the whole situation.

"Oh, I know, it's hilarious. Laugh it up," he says, though he can't bring himself to put any malice into his tone. "I'd like to see you try riding a motorcycle back home. Actually, you probably couldn't, it would be way too small... whoa!" he flails a little as the direhorse shifts nervously under him with a loud nicker. "Uh, easy girl," he pats its neck in what he hopes is a reassuring fashion.

"A'lai cannot sense what you want," Jared strokes the direhorse's neck with his large hand, and she quiets down almost immediately. "You must form _tsaheylu_ with her."

"I'm sorry, what?"

" _Tsaheylu_ ," Jared repeats, and motions to somewhere near Jensen's back.

"I don't understand."

Jared looks at him, perplexed. "I think in your language it is...bond?"

"You want me to bond with the direhorse."

" _P'ali_ cannot be ridden except if you form bond. It is how they know what you wish them to do."

"Okay, I'm going to pretend that forming a bond with the horse doesn't sound way dirtier in my head than it probably is in real life. How do I do that?"

There's a moment of hesitation. "You do not have this where you come from?"

"No, otherwise I wouldn't be asking."

Jared looks at him like Jensen has just grown an extra head, or has just confessed that he doesn't know what colours are, or something equally as bizarre and unnatural. "You do so with your _tswin_ ," he says, like he's explaining something to a really dimwitted child.

" _Tswin?_ "

To his surprise, Jared actually blushes. Then he reaches up a little diffidently, and gently grasps Jensen's braid between his thumb and forefinger. Even through the protective layer of hair, Jensen feels the same small jolt of electricity run through him as before. " _Tswin_ ," Jared says succinctly, and suddenly things start to make a lot more sense.

"Oh. Oh, okay. I, uh, kind of wondered what that was... yeah, okay," Jensen blushes a little bit when he suddenly gets that this is probably a much more intimate gesture than is warranted for two guys who've known each other for only a couple of days. Even if Jared did save his life. He clears his throat. "Okay, uh, so what do I... how do I do this?" He has to force himself not to squeeze his eyes shut in embarrassment.

Jared looks away quickly, then reaches over and pulls one of the direhorse's long antenna-like things back from its head. "You make to join with her, like this," he gestures, and once he does that it all becomes kind of obvious.

Jensen nods, takes the antenna gently in his hand, and luckily for him the avatar body seems to know what it's doing all on its own, because the small tendrils emerge from his braid of their own accord in order to twine with the ones that have emerged from the direhorse's antenna. He feels a jolt as the two connect and interweave, like an electrical shock except...he can't begin to describe it. His mind is suddenly awash with conflicting signals, with sights and smells and sounds, feelings that aren't his own. He gasps, lets go of the direhorse's neck, and the next thing he knows he's face down in the grass in a tangle of arms and legs. Somewhere behind him he hears Jared burst into gales of laughter. He pushes himself up onto his arms, spits out a mouthful of grass, flips over onto his back.

"Oh, it's hilarious, I'm sure," he rolls his eyes, but clambers to his feet. "I guess this is what they mean by getting right back up on that horse when you fall off."

Jared is still snorting with laughter, but he shows Jensen a couple of quick tricks to mount the direhorse while making less of an ass of himself this time around. For a split-second Jensen allows himself to think that it's going better than he expected it to, until he tries to 'bond' with the direhorse again and finds himself landing back on his ass on the ground, thoroughly winded and with Jared's laughter ringing in his ears. This time, though, Jared's isn't the only laughter he hears. Looking up, Jensen catches sight of Tsu'tey, the guy who Grace told him would be clan chief one day, whooping it up along with some of the other warriors. He yells out something in Na'vi, and it doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out that whatever he's saying, it's pretty unflattering.

"Hey, why don't you tell your buddies over there to can it?" he snaps, good mood evaporated.

There's an accompanying string of shouted Na'vi back and forth, mostly good-natured barbs from what little Jensen can tell from their body language, although the comments directed at him are definitely more hostile. Jared seems kind of outnumbered, but he's giving as good as he's getting thus far. If Jensen's memories of schoolyard bullies are any good, he figures it's probably not a good idea to try to 'help' Jared with this little situation. Besides, for all he knows Jared is agreeing with them and he just can't tell. The conversation gets a little more heated after that, with Tsu'tey apparently losing his temper and gesticulating emphatically in Jensen's direction. For a while it seems like Jared is trying to placate him, but eventually he loses his temper too, and the whole thing ends in a stand-off, with Tsu'tey taking off with his friends in another direction with a few last bits of invective thrown over their shoulders.

"So... friends of yours?" Jensen asks, rubbing at what's probably going to be a spectacular bruise on his hip later on.

"Yes," Jared answers, much to his surprise.

"Really? From what I could see, I kind of assumed you weren't friends at all."

"Tsu'tey and I grow up together. We attend the school of _dok-tor_ Grace. He and I are very close."

Jensen feels his eyebrows rise right up to his hairline. "Hell, with friends like that, who needs enemies?"

Jared glares at him, and when he speaks again his tone has turned ice cold. "You should not speak of things you don't know. Try again," he jerks his head toward the direhorse, and just like that, the subject is closed.

* * *

Things don't exactly go well after that. It feels like Jensen accidentally stepped on a hornet's nest, and no matter where he turns or what he does, he keeps getting stung. Everything he tries gets him a rebuke from Jared, delivered in snapping tones or with an impatient roll of the eyes, like he's too stupid to even tie his own damned shoes. Not that the Na'vi wear shoes, but whatever.

"Look, I'm trying here, okay?" he snaps after Jared calls him an idiot for what feels like the thousandth time that day. It's practically the first word that Jensen managed to learn because Jared uses it so damned much. _Skawng_ , or moron. Retarded. Slow. You name it, the word covers it.

"Try again," Jared says, pointing at the huge log on which he's been trying to get Jensen to balance.

Jensen blows out a breath. "Right. Because I totally haven't been trying up until now."

It's not the balancing that's the problem, not really. This is pretty much like everything else from basic training. It's just that this log is, oh, several hundred feet in the air and Jared has him doing some pretty complicated shit while he's up there involving his spear. It's like martial arts katas, Jensen tells himself, nothing more than that, except that he can't quite shake the conviction that he's about to plummet to the forest floor and break his damned neck and then where will they be?

It doesn't help that things haven't exactly been going all that well back on the human side of things, either. Norm hasn't made a secret of his newfound feelings of hostility toward him, for reasons Jensen can only begin to guess at. It's not like he planned to get attacked by a goddamned giant panther and get chased right into the waiting arms of the local natives, but they way Norm's been acting it's like it was all this big secret conspiracy to get Jensen in with the Na'vi instead of him. Right now, Jensen would trade places with him in a heartbeat if it didn't involve this terrifying balancing act several hundred feet over the ground.

"You are thinking too much," Jared calls out from his very safe spot on a ledge formed by a huge gnarled knot in a tree trunk. "You must feel your body, let your feet do what they already know to do."

"God, I can't believe this," he mutters under his breath. He forces himself to keep his eyes closed the way Jared instructed, heart hammering against his ribs, the blood pulsing and roaring in his ears from pure, unadulterated fear. "If I fall and die, it'll be on your head!" he yells back.

"You will not fall," Jared's voice is suddenly right there in his ear, so quiet that it sends a thrill rushing through Jensen. He never even heard him approach, but his breath is hot on the back of Jensen's neck. "Keep your eyes closed, and bring the spear forward. Like this," he grasps Jensen's left shoulder, guides his right arm in the movement. "Your body is born with this. Feel the movement only."

"I don't suppose I can bond with the spear instead?"

Jared snorts. "Try again."

The movement flows a bit more easily the next time he tries, and eventually he finds a rhythm. Doubtless Norm is going to give him a hard time about this when he gets back, like dancing with spears is something he would already know about if he'd spent three years training for this, or whatever. Grace has mostly managed to keep the two of them apart for the past few days, but she's been increasingly busy preparing for their move up into the mountains, and inevitably it fell to Norm to help Jensen with some of the cultural stuff he's been trying to learn, mostly when it comes to language.

"I don't care what sort of pissing contest you boys have got going on," Grace spat at them just yesterday, "but have yourselves a mud wrestling match or whatever it is you need to do to get the testosterone out of your systems and work it out! I am not running a kindergarten here. You have a job to do, so act like adults and get it done. Now, if you'll excuse me, I have an administrator with his head so far up his ass I'm expecting to see burns on his face from his own gastric acid to deal with," she'd snarled before turning on her heel and heading up to Selfridge's office.

Jensen can't really blame her for being in a foul mood. Selfridge and Quaritch have both been going out of their way to get in the way of their moving their base of operations for the precise reason that Grace wanted to get them out of there in the first place. It's harder to supervise a group of scientists when they're several thousand feet above sea level after all. They're going to get out, though, and when it became obvious that there was nothing to be done about it, Quaritch took Jensen aside.

"Look, son, I know you like the good doctor and all that, but I need you to stay focused on your mission while you're up there. Augustine, she's got her head in a different game than ours, and it'll be easy for you to get caught up when all you've got is her and that dork Spellman to talk to. So you send word back regularly. You'll have working coms, so I expect regular reports. If you can't send them direct, then you give 'em to Trudy Chacon so she can give 'em back to me, you understand?"

"Yes, sir. I don't think it'll be a problem. Grace wants us to record everything anyway, so I can just send you back a copy of whatever it is I get on video."

Quaritch had clapped him on the shoulder at that. "Good man. If everything goes our way, we can rotate you back home in under a year, get you all set up again the way you want."

"Jensen!" Jared's voice jolts him back to the present. His eyes snap open and he flails for balance, feet sliding on the damp moss of the tree trunk. For a heart-stopping moment he's convinced he's falling, the spear drops from his hands to go spiralling toward the ground.

A hand closes over his wrist, pulls him upward, and Jared scowls at him. "You will have to fetch your spear," he says curtly, while Jensen tries desperately to catch his breath, feeling like his heart is trying to make a getaway through his throat. Jared points toward the nearest tree trunk. "You should start climbing. It is a long way down."

"Right."

By the time he emerges from the link late that evening it's too late even for dinner, and the lab is all but deserted except for the lone tech keeping an eye on his link. "You were out for a while," she says disapprovingly. "You should grab an MRE from the mess hall. Don't go to bed on an empty stomach.

He grimaces apologetically at her. "Sorry I made you miss dinner."

She shrugs. "Whatever. You'll make it up to me some other time."

"Flowers or chocolate?"

That makes her crack a smile. "No chocolate here, and I don't think the flowers would survive indoors, but I appreciate the thought. Now get out of here so I can close up. You okay?" she asks, features pulling into a frown as he gingerly pulls himself into his wheelchair.

He feels like warmed-over crap, but he nods. "Yeah, fine. Just tired. You'd be surprised how tiring it is, lying down all day."

"If you don't feel well, you should stop by the infirmary, get yourself checked out. Sometimes linking up affects you in ways you weren't expecting."

"Thanks for the advice. You have a good night now," he wheels himself carefully between the link beds and out through the door, bypasses the mess hall completely and just drags himself to bed.

* * *

Ìla'rey is surprised to find Tsu'tey waiting for him when Jensen has gone to sleep. He still finds it unnerving to watch Jensen fall asleep and just simply… stop, and so he usually leaves before Jensen's spirit leaves the body he has come to occupy during the day. Mo'at still believes it to be unnatural and against the will of Eywa, but already Jared is beginning to think there may be more to it than that. He remembers going to the school taught by _dok-tor_ Grace, and there was never any question then of her not being truly who she was.

"We did not finish our conversation," Tsu'tey says seriously, and Ìla'rey sighs.

"No, we didn't," he agrees. "But I wonder what you could have to tell me that you haven't already shouted many times today, in front of my guest."

"He is your pupil, not your guest," Tsu'tey reminds him. "And you should remember that. I have seen how you look at him. I think you are letting your heart cloud your judgement where he is concerned. He is nice to look at, Ìla'rey, but he is not one of us."

"I know that!" Ìla'rey retorts hotly. "Every minute that passes is a reminder of this."

"I am not saying these things to spite you, despite what you seem to think. Your mother and father have put a great deal of trust in you for this. Everything rides upon your success."

"What's your point?"

Tsu'tey gives a small hiss of impatience and flicks his ears, tail twitching as though he'd like nothing more than to simply wrestle Ìla'rey to the ground like when they were children and solved all their problems by these means.

"My point is that you can't run away from this if Jensen can't be made to learn our ways. You and I have been friends since we were children. I know you better than you know yourself. I see you, Ìla'rey, and I know your heart. Already you care too much for this man, and if he will not see our ways you will not simply be allowed to run away this time, as you do from your other responsibilities. It is one thing to play at refusing the role of _tsahik_ , but you are too old to keep doing it."

Ìla'rey snorts softly. "Not everyone can be as responsible as you," he says a little sullenly, then jumps a little when Tsu'tey leans forward and, lightning-fast, cuffs him hard behind the head. He yelps. "What was that for?"

"You are past the age for childish tantrums and sulking," his friend barks. "Your parents may humour you because they love you, but I am your friend and your equal and I will not do you such a disservice. This is an opportunity for you to prove yourself, but you must be prepared for the human to fail. And there are those among the tribe who are waiting only for that in order to throw this back in your mother's face."

Ìla'rey glances behind him almost involuntarily. He has no idea what will happen if Jensen doesn't pass the tests he is given, but he does know that the elders will not tolerate his presence if that happens. He squares his shoulders.

"I will not let him fail," he says determinedly. "I know that I am right about this, and regardless of what you think, I am not going to run away from this, either."

To his surprise, Tsu'tey claps him on the shoulder, grinning widely. "I am glad to hear it. Who knows, maybe this will finally be the task that convinces you to grow up."

Ìla'rey jabs him none too gently in the ribs, but he can't help grinning back. "I certainly hope not. Come on, there is still some light left in the day. Come swimming with me."

Tsu'tey heaves an exaggerated sigh, but he nods, and Ìla'rey doesn't miss the knowing look his friend directs at him before they take off at a run toward the river.

* * *

"God damn it, Selfridge, just admit you're trying to sabotage the operation and stop pussyfooting around like you're doing us a damned favour!"

Grace's voice is audible all the way outside the hangar as Jensen wheels himself forward on his last morning in the main compound. He has all his gear stowed in the small pack resting on his lap, everything else they're going to need already packed on Trudy's Samson and just waiting for them to take off. Jensen finds his boss facing off with his other boss just underneath the tilt-rotor. Selfridge looks entirely out of place here in his immaculately-pressed suit and slicked-back hair, and he's let himself be backed up into a not-so-metaphorical corner by Grace's wrath.

"Don't get your undies in a twist, Augustine," he says, palms up in a placating gesture. "I just want to make sure that everything is in order, and you haven't exactly followed protocol on this, may I remind you."

"Take your protocol and stick it up your ass, you little twit," Grace snarls, and Jensen can't help but admire her a little bit for it. "We've jumped through every single flaming hoop you put in front of us, and now you're going to stop us because our flight isn't authorized? You know who authorizes flights, Selfridge? You do. So when you said five days ago we could leave, it was up to you to put your flimsy, useless little signature down on the flight plan or tick 'yes' in the little box, or whatever you have to do to make sure this mission isn't put into jeopardy!"

"And that's exactly what I'm doing!" he snaps. "You have a fully-equipped laboratory right here on the compound. Why the hell do you need to haul up into the mountains where there's no one else and the lab isn't as well-designed, except if you're trying to keep things from us?"

"You know as well as I do that I am not the one who has problems with words like 'transparency' and 'accountability,' you little rat."

"Language, Augustine, language. You keep on calling people names, eventually someone's going to take it the wrong way and not want to play nice with you anymore, no matter what your credentials are."

Grace glares at him so hard that Jensen halfway expects to see the man wither right there on the spot, and is kind of impressed when he doesn't. "You're going to be getting regular reports. Now, get out of my way."

To Jensen's surprise, Selfridge backs off, but not before giving a none-too-subtle wink in his direction. "Bon voyage!" he calls out before sauntering back out the way Jensen came.

"Okay," Trudy calls out from where she's climbing into the cockpit. "Let's get this show on the road! Everyone get your re-breather masks on, locate the emergency spares in case something goes spectacularly wrong, and strap in! We've got a really long, really bumpy ride ahead of us, so I suggest you get comfortable!"

Jensen swings himself aboard, letting the crew fold up his chair and stow it on board. It didn't occur to him to ask about just how accessible the remote station would be, but it's too late to wonder about that now. If nothing else, it'll end up being Grace or Norm's problem, not that he's exactly enamoured of the idea of being hauled around like an inconvenient sack of potatoes. He straps himself into his seat, breath fogging up the plastic of his re-breather mask in the cool morning air. Grace and Norm's avatars are in the back of the tilt-rotor, looking peaceful, almost like they're asleep rather than completely inanimate. He wonders what his own body looks like when he's out in his avatar, if he looks like he's asleep, or like he's dead, like Tommy did moments before the incinerator claimed him.

He shakes his head, banishing the morbid thoughts, and stares outside instead at the scenery going by in a blur. As the tilt-rotor climbs the trees become a little more defined, stop rushing by quite as fast, and he's able to get a decent look at the surrounding countryside. The colours are different, somehow, though he can't tell if it's because his human eyes aren't adjusting to the light or because the mask is distorting them. He'll never be able to tell, he realizes, not unless his lungs magically adapt to the toxic atmosphere out here. The thought makes him oddly sad, like it's a reminder that he's never really going to know what it's truly like out here.

Eventually the tilt-rotor flies out far past the small patch of geography with which Jensen has become familiar, and heads out further over the treetops, droning determinedly forward into a swirling cloud of mist.

"See the magnetic formations?" Grace points to a huge rock formation whose arches are barely visible through the fog. "We're very close."

"Yeah, we are," Trudy agrees. She has Norm up in the cockpit with her, giving him a crash-course in piloting the Samson, just in case something happens and they need to get back in a hurry without her. "Look at the instruments," she tells him now. "See how they're fritzing out? We're in the flux vortex now. VFR from now on."

"What's VFR?" Norm asks.

"It means you gotta see where you're going," Trudy flicks a couple of switches and cracks her gum.

"But you can't see anything!" Norm protests.

"Exactly," she smirks. "Ain't that a bitch? Okay, boys and girls, this is it. Take a look for yourselves, because this never, ever gets old."

Jensen twists in his jump seat, cranes his neck in time to see a huge moss-covered boulder whiz by the open door of the chopper, half-obscured by the fog. It seems to come out of nowhere, a huge shadow that only takes form when it's mere yards away from them. His eyes widen in shock, even though he's seen pictures of the famous floating mountains of Pandora as well as vid footage, but seeing them up close like this is a whole different ballgame. The tilt-rotor bursts up through the mist, leaving it behind like it's shedding a blanket, and the blue sky appears above them, bright and dazzling. The mountains are enormous, far bigger than he could have imagined in his wildest dreams—enormous islands of rock that simply hang in the air like something out of a surrealistic painting, connected by straggly beards of vine. Water cascades over the rocks in a giant waterfall and disappears into a cloud of droplets hundreds of yards below, the ground completely invisible to the naked eye. Jensen shudders a little, forces his gaze back upward and away from the seemingly bottomless abyss below. It feels like the entire world has simply disappeared, that there’s nowhere left to go but up.

* * *

"Thank you for flying Air Pandora," Trudy deadpans as they come to hover over the makeshift landing strip on a promontory right near the mountains. It's little more than a field of high grass that sways and ripples under the tilt-rotors whirring blades. "The current temperature at our destination is a balmy eighty-two degrees and sunny. Please make sure your seats and trays are in the full upright and locked positions as we prepare for landing, and make no attempt to leave your seats until the captain has turned off the fasten seatbelt sign."

"Smartass," Grace smiles as Trudy brings them down in a landing so smooth Jensen barely feels so much as a jolt as they touch ground.

Trudy jumps from the cockpit before the engine even has time to start cooling off, pulls Jensen's wheelchair from the back and unfolds it, waiting for him to unstrap himself from his jump seat. He has to slide along the floor of the chopper before pulling each leg to dangle over the side, and she catches him by the armpits as he tries to slip to the ground. There's no dignified way to do this, and she grunts a little under the strain.

"Damn, you sure ate your Wheaties when you were a kid," she jokes, pivoting so that she can drop him into the chair. "You good?"

Jensen's landed a little awkwardly, but he manages to get himself straightened out without too much trouble. "Yeah, I'm good. Thanks," he tries not to sound too grudging about it. He screws up his face as he views the uneven terrain that leads to the two airlift modules —little more than bus-shaped shacks— that are going to serve as his home away from home for the next few months. "Oh, this is going to suck."

"I realize it's not the Ritz, but it'll serve," Grace says dryly. "As far as mobile outposts go, it's state-of-the-art, so you should count your blessings."

He gives her a flat look. "I wasn't talking about the accommodations. Hell, I've lived in way worse than that. I am, however," he motions toward the uneven ground, which is littered with rocks, "going to need some help getting there. No way I can get this chair over all of that without getting stuck or tipping over."

"Oh, right."

"Yeah, I get it. Not something you need to think about."

She swats him lightly behind the head in a clear message to watch his tone, but Trudy obligingly gets behind the chair and helps to push him toward the modules. It's bumpy going, but Trudy is apparently a little more wiry than she looks because they make pretty decent time, and are even the first to make it inside. Grace pushes past them a moment later.

"All right, I'm going to go power up the generator. Norm, I'm going to need you to go help Trudy and the others unpack the chopper. Jensen, since unpacking obviously isn't going to be your thing, you're going to help me set up the place so that it's inhabitable by humans again by tonight. Otherwise we're all going to have a pretty uncomfortable time of it."

"Aye aye," Jensen mutters, giving his chair a shove in order to get past the lip of the doorsill.

Inside it's a narrow fit for his chair, but he finds that if he manoeuvres carefully, he can make his way around pretty much the whole complex. Not that it's all that big, but it's still big enough that it would pose a challenge if the passageways were any narrower than they are. There are three main sections: the link room, which is set up pretty much the same as the one back at the main compound except with fewer beds, the main living area with closed-off bunks and a tiny kitchen and multiple refrigerators (only one of which, he notes with some amusement, has a note stuck to it that reads 'Only food in this fridge, please,' making him wonder just what else they've been in the habit of storing in the fridges here), and way in the back a tiny lab and another room that looks like it serves as a makeshift infirmary in case of need.

Grace has disappeared around the back, and a moment later he hears the generator whirr into life. She makes him wait before taking off his re-breather mask until she's sure that not only is the ventilation system working properly, but that the place hasn't sprung any leaks in her absence.

"I haven't been out here in at least seven months," she comments as she makes the rounds of the equipment, quietly giving him instructions on everything from switching on the computers to making sure that nothing was left behind in the refrigerators that might have gone bad. The fridges are empty, but he can respect the fact that she wants to be certain. There's nothing like having spoiled food sitting around for months to make a place like this really uninhabitable.

"What were you using it for then?"

"It gives us easier access to some parts of the moon. The mobile links are a real asset when we're collecting samples from far enough away that the flight alone would take us out past dark."

"And Quaritch doesn't let Trudy and the other pilots fly night missions," Jensen nods as understanding dawns.

"You got it. He has a point, too. The skies aren't safe even during the day, but at night there are all sorts of nocturnal predators which are much bigger and badder than a Samson. It only takes one to knock us out of the sky, after all. Okay, you can take your mask off now."

It's a relief to be rid of the confining plastic. Jensen pulls in a breath, tasting stale, recycled air, and finds himself wishing he could be back outside again. "When do you think I'll be able to go back out?"

"Eager, aren't you?" Grace smiles a little indulgently. She's been playing nice with him the more time he spends with the Na'vi, and he figures it's because she wants back in with the tribe. Not that he can blame her. It's her life's work, after all, and if their positions were reversed he isn't sure he wouldn't be doing the same thing. Maybe. He can't really imagine devoting his life to this sort of thing, and yet here he is. "I don't see why you can' t go back out tomorrow morning. You've been here for almost two days, and it's not like the Na'vi have any of the necessary technology to take care of your avatar when you're not in it."

"Yeah, about that...We're going to have to tell them, or I don't know, get them to let me come out of there at some point. I mean, if I'm gone for more than a couple of days that body's going to starve, right?"

"Nothing quite so terrible, but yeah, I wouldn't mind giving it a once-over, just to make sure everything's still working the way it should."

Norm comes into the lab at that point, sweating and out of breath. "Okay, we're all unloaded. Jensen, since you don't have all that far to go now, how about coming and helping us unpack the crates while Grace finishes setting up?" he says a little acidly, and Jensen can tell that the barb was intentional. He rolls his eyes.

"Certainly. It'll be my pleasure to assist you in whatever way you need," he doesn't bother masking the sarcasm in his tone. "Just point me in the direction of the heavy shit."

"Too late. I just thought you'd want to make yourself useful, for once."

"Funny, coming from you."

"All right, that's enough!" Grace snaps. "Honestly, we haven't been here five minutes and you two are already at it. Save it for later."

"He started it," Jensen mutters under his breath, already wheeling himself back toward the main entrance where Trudy and Norm have unloaded all the boxes from their trip.

"What?"

"Nothing!" he yells over his shoulder, then grabs the nearest box, marked "log books," and starts back toward the lab. The faster he goes, he tells himself, the faster they'll be done, and he can get out of the way of Norm and his vast repertoire of dirty looks.

* * *

 

It's a relief to get back in the saddle, both literally and figuratively. After two days of being in his own body, he awakens in his avatar to find himself absolutely starving. Also, to his dismay, he's completely alone. He's not sure why he was expecting Jared to be there, except maybe because he was around all the other times. It's still relatively early in the morning, even by the tribe's standards, but he doubts that Jared or any of the others are still asleep. He gets to his feet, pushes his way past the cloth door that keeps his quarters separate from the rest of the village, and goes in search of Jared and food, not necessarily in that order. Instead of either of those things, he finds Tsu'tey, sitting cross-legged by the entrance to what Jensen guesses is his own home, intent on the task of restringing his bow. He gives Jensen a slightly unfriendly look, but it's not nearly as hostile as before.

" _Kaltxì_ ," Jensen makes an effort to get the intonation right, and Tsu'tey inclines his head in acknowledgement.

"Good morning."

"You do speak English."

"It is more important that you learn our language," Tsu'tey says, looking back at his bow.

"I bet you're a real charmer with the ladies," Jensen mutters. "Look, I'm doing my best, but I'm kind of new at all of this, so how about cutting me some slack, here?"

Tsu'tey gives his bowstring an experimental tug. "I don't understand your words."  
"I mean, be patient. I'm trying, here."

"Try harder."

Jensen blows out a breath. "Come on! What do you want from me?"

Tsu'tey gazes levelly at him. "You Sky People are all the same. You think only of yourselves, never of others. You don't think beyond self," he raps his fist against his chest. "Do you think of Ìla'rey? Do you think what you do?"

"You mean Jared?"

Tsu'tey nods. "He is my friend, from long time."

Jensen isn't sure where this is going, but he gets a sudden suspicion that this is important. "He mentioned that you two grew up together, right?" He approaches carefully, and when he isn't rebuffed he sits down, cross-legged, mimicking Tsu'tey's stance unconsciously. "So what am I missing here? Maybe you all think I'm an idiot —a _skxawng_ , but I'm trying to learn. You don't expect your children to learn everything overnight, right? So help me out, here."

The warrior gives him a considering look, visibly weighing his options in his mind. "Ìla'rey is important man in Omaticaya tribe. I think you do not know he is important."

"He's supposed to be the new _tsahik_ , right? Like Mo'at."

"The _tsahik_ is most important person. More important than eytkan, even, which I will be when Eytukan is no more. _Tsahik_ is always woman," he says, emphasising the word as though it's of vital importance.

"Jared isn't a woman."

"Yes."

Jensen throws up his hands. "Okay, no, I don't get it. If the _tsahik_ is always a woman and Jared's a guy, then how come he's going to be the _tsahik_?"

" _Tsahik_ is gift, not person. Mo'at believes Ila'rey has gift, but not all Omaticaya think this. There are many who think that Ila'rey should not be _tsahik_ , that gift is not passed down there. You understand now?"

Jensen's head hurts, and he wishes he was having this conversation on a full stomach, but he thinks he gets it. "It's politics," he says. "There's a faction that doesn't want Jared to take his mother's place. I bet they've got themselves a girl they want in his place, a girl who's more favourable to them. Am I right?"

Tsu'tey inclines his head again, but says nothing to show he agrees or disagrees with Jensen's assessment. "You are test for Ìla'rey. He is to interpret the will of Eywa. He says there is sign, so now he must prove that he is right when he interprets sign."

"You mean when all those seed-things swarmed me? The _atokirina_ , I mean?" Jensen's mind is whirling. "That was supposed to be a sign, right? Jesus," he breathes as things slowly start to become clear in his head. "Okay, so he sees all the seed things, and he thinks it's a sign that I'm supposed to stick around. His mother backs him up, but he's basically put everyone on the spot with that declaration," he's thinking aloud, putting two and two together as he goes. "So she has to do something to save face, and she gives me to him as a kind of, what, a task? A way to prove what he is?"

"Maybe you are not so stupid as we think," Tsu'tey is carefully not looking at him. "This is test. If you fail, Jensen, you will be sent back to your people, but Ìla'rey must stay here."

"And then everybody thinks that he doesn't have the gift, that he's basically a fraud and that his mother's judgement is clouded where he's concerned because he's her son and she loves him."

"I trust in Mo'at. She is a very wise _tsahik_ , has always given good counsel to the tribe. You are trouble for her, for Ila'rey, even if you don't mean to cause it. They are family, Ila'rey is friend, bonded to me."

"Bonded?"

Tsu'tey scoffs quietly. "Ìla'rey tells me you do not have bond, where you come from, and so you don't understand. But it's important. You don't see."

"So you all keep telling me. I'm trying to see, I really am."

Tsu'tey brings his newly-strung bow around and jabs Jensen none too gently in the chest. "You see what you expect to see, because you do not pay attention. All children learn when they are small: you do not speak before you hear, you do not act before you see. Look, learn to see. Do not think before you look, think only afterward. _Kame_ , it is not the same word in your language. You do not see as the Na'vi do."

Jensen gets up again. "Actually, I think I might be starting to get it." He bows his head in acknowledgement. "Thank you."

Tsu'tey rises as well. "Ìla'rey is with his parents. They will have food for you, if you are hungry."

* * *

When he finds Jared, it's in the middle of what looks like a heated, if quiet, conversation with his mother. The moment he catches sight of Jensen, though, he turns toward him, the discussion clearly brought to a standstill.

"You are awake! I thought perhaps they would not let you Dreamwalk again."

He shakes his head. "We're having a bit of a problem back home, but it's nothing Grace can't handle. We just needed a couple of days to sort it all out. Politics, you know how it goes. One side doesn't agree with how the other side is handling things."

Jared gives him a shrewd look. "I understand this, yes. There is food, if you are hungry."

Mo'at beckons him forward. "You may join us, Jensen. There is food for you at our hearth. Come and be welcome."

He bows. " _Irayo._ "

She smiles a little grimly. "You are learning, I see. This is good."

Breakfast is something of an awkward affair. Jensen is too worried about paying attention to his table manners to be able to do more than pay cursory attention to the conversation, and only manages to pick up a word here and there. Mo'at talks quietly with her husband for the most part, and Jared doesn't bother to translate. Jensen figures it's probably got to do with village affairs, and even though he's curious he figures that eventually he'll be able to understand this sort of thing, if he practices enough.

"So are we going to try riding again today?" he asks. They haven't gone back since the first day he tried and ended up on his ass more times than he could count, but he'll be damned if that direhorse is going to get the best of him. Jared looks a little surprised.

"You want to try again?"

Jensen grins. "Heck yeah. I mean, what's the point of learning if you don't make mistakes at first, right? Eventually I'll get the hang of it."

Jared tilts his head in that odd way the Na'vi have of agreeing with something even when they're not quite sure they've fully understood it. "We will go after you are done eating."

"Awesome. So did I miss anything while I was away? Nothing earth-shattering, I hope."

"Earth-" Jared gives him a questioning look.

"It's an expression. It means something really important."

Jared shrugs. "Nothing you would find important."

The implication is clear, that even though it's something Jared finds important, he doesn't think much of Jensen's judgement. Not yet, anyway. Jensen bristles a little bit.

"You'd be surprised at what I find important. Why don't you try me? I'm willing to bet that you've been catching a lot of grief because you have to babysit me instead of doing what it is you normally do around these parts. Am I wrong?"

The room has gone silent, and he can feel Mo'at and Eytukan's attention on him as well, but he's not going to back down now, knowing what he knows. Jared meets his gaze evenly.

"You are not wrong, no," he concedes. "But you don't understand what it means."

Jensen takes a calculated risk, concentrates on his words. " _Oel ngati kmeie_."

Jared's eyebrows raise a fraction. " _Oel ngati kmeie_ ," he says back, gently correcting Jensen's pronunciation. "I don't think you see," he says after a moment, "but I think you try, and that is a start."

* * *

"It still feels weird to just be talking into this camera sometimes. Like, is there a person on the other end? I don't even know. I keep assuming there will be someone at some point, but it's not always going to be the same person, either, and that just makes it even weirder, you know? Like, I wouldn't talk to my parents the same way I'd talk to Grace or to Quaritch. Hell, even this log, which is supposed to be a private diary or whatever, I don't know. Maybe someone's paying attention when I think they're not looking.

"I think I'm getting a little paranoid. Grace and Norm are contagious that way. I guess when you're a scientist in the middle of a military-run complex, it can start to feel like you're constantly surrounded by guns, I guess. I don't know, I like guns, so it's sort of hard to sympathize. I miss being back at the main base. Out here, it's just me and them and Trudy and Sasha, the tech, and she barely ever says a word to me. She seems to like Norm well enough, though, so I guess that's good. It's important to have someone to talk to out here, especially since she's the only one who can't really go anywhere. Trudy's got her Samson, and Norm and Grace and me can always leave here mentally even if we can't really leave physically. I think Norm likes her too, but it's not like he and I are having all that many heart-to-hearts about stuff lately. I know he and Trudy have hooked up a couple of times, but I don't really know how serious that whole thing is.

"The days are all kind of starting to blur together. I'm out there with Jared every day, but the Na'vi don't tell the time the same way we do. They watch the sun rise and set, and they have a specific way of looking at the passing seasons because it's important for the hunt and for what food and plants they have to go out and get, but the days of the week don't matter to them. It's not like they keep appointments or anything like that. They eat when it's time, judging more or less by the position of the sun and the stars and the shadow of the big planet that sometimes falls on the moon's surface. That's something else I've found hard to get used to: the idea that we're on a moon over a planet, rather than on a planet looking up at a moon. It's strange, the things I wasn't expecting, and that's one of them.

"We've been up here for nearly a week now, and there's no sign that we're going to be heading back anytime soon. Trudy is supposed to go in every two weeks to resupply, but Grace is keeping me on a short leash, which I get. She's a smart woman, she knows I answer to Quaritch and Selfridge as much as I do to her, and probably more to them than her, so she wants me where she can see me, for the most part. I can't really blame her for that. I like her, actually, which kind of surprised me. At first I just figured she was a bitch with control issues, and that's part of it, yeah, but there's more to her than that. I think she kind of likes me too, even though she acts like I'm a retarded nuisance. She does care, in her own way, even though sometimes her caring about my physical well-being is more about her personal convenience than about my welfare.

"Okay, that wasn't exactly fair. It's just frustrating, being the guy in the wheelchair around here. God, I really hope no one but me is actually listening to this. I'm not trying to throw a pity-party or anything, honest. It's just that a lot of the time they forget that just getting from one side of this damn place to the other is like running a freaking obstacle course, and they leave their shit lying around so that if I have to go to the can in the night it's a major hassle.

"Right. I'm not allowed to delete anything I say, Grace's rules, but I think that last part's gonna go. Posterity doesn't want to hear me whining about how difficult my life is or about the fact that my back hurts or the fact that the link beds here aren't exactly as comfortable as the ones back on base. So, forgive me, but it's gonna go."

* * *

Grace is leaning against the counter in the lab when Jensen switches off his video log and wheels himself back out. "Talking about me again?" she smirks, and he finds himself flushing, much to his embarrassment.

"You been listening in?"

"No," she fiddles with an unlit cigarette, rolling it gently between her fingers. "But you get this really guilty look every time you make a personal log and end up talking about me. I have two theories. The first is that you're saying nasty things about how I'm a controlling bitch, and the second is that you're secretly having really filthy fantasies about me. Personally," she interrupts his indignant squawk of denial, "I think my first theory is the more probable."

"I don't think you're a controlling bitch," he manages a little lamely.

She arches an eyebrow. "You don't? Then you're blind. But that's okay, you weren't hired for your observational skills, that much is for sure. So if you weren't talking about me, then you were talking about Jared, right?"

"Not this time," he grins. "Just stuff about what's been happening here. It's all kind of going by so fast, you know? It feels like we just got here yesterday, but it's already been a week."

"And it's going to keep going by just as fast. I feel like I just got here myself, but it's been over ten years. Nearly sixteen if you count the years I spent in cryo. I don't get news of home much anymore," Grace lights her cigarette, but the casual gesture can't hide the wistfulness in her tone. "You start to forget that there's anything else out there. It's easy to get lost in the rush here."

"Did you leave your family back home?" Jensen's suddenly curious.

She drops easily into a nearby chair. "My parents died a long time ago. I'm an only child, no cousins near my age. I left friends behind, sure, but no one else. My friends are all past retirement age now, and I think some of them have died. Probably more of them than I know of, since no one bothers to send messages anymore. Then again, I don't send messages home, either, and that sort of thing is a two-way street. How about you, Marine? You got people back on Earth?"

He nods. "My parents. I haven't heard from them yet, but it's only been a couple of weeks. I don't know, I thought for sure they'd have sent a message ahead, but I guess they didn't. Maybe they couldn't, or they didn't know how. They're not really good with the newer communication stuff. I set up an account for them to use, so maybe when I get back, there'll be something."

He doesn't mention the small, nagging fear that's been at the back of his mind ever since he first checked for messages and found none, that something's happened to his parents in the years he was gone. He can check that his money transfers have gone through, but that doesn't mean there's anyone left to collect them, leaving them to sit, unused, in some bank account on Earth.

Grace takes a drag off her cigarette, blows the smoke away from him in a gesture that's as useless as it is considerate. It's not like the smoke isn't going to sit there and stagnate until the ventilation system sucks it away and purifies it again. He wonders about that, sometimes, the obvious disregard for other people's well-being combined with an odd streak of caring. He can't wrap his mind around her.

"So what made you want to do this?" he asks, motioning at the lab in an all-encompassing gesture.

She grins. "Are you kidding? To get to be at the cutting edge of my field, light years ahead of all my colleagues? I would have given a kidney for that. Maybe more, I don't know. I got to pioneer this program, to be the first to drive an avatar, even before it was proven to be safe. I put this whole expedition together, the scientific part of it, anyway. This is my life's work, kid, right here in front of you. It's been thirty-five years in the making. I've been working on this since I was about your age, and nothing else has ever mattered to me as much as this."

He feels his eyes widen at that, but she's not really paying attention to him, lost in her own world, like she's just thinking aloud at him. When she does look at him, though, her eyes are almost frightening in their intensity, pupils blown wide. "You know, you're right at the age where you think you ought to be making a difference in the world, where every gesture matters, but how many people actually get to do that?" she says, leaning forward, cigarette forgotten. "Think about it, Jensen. What were your plans, except maybe to keep on following the orders of people you were never going to see, never going to meet? When I was your age, I got to be in on the ground floor of planning an expedition into the far reaches of space so we could save the whole damned human race, whether we deserve it or not. Who else can say that? Not many people, that's for damned sure!"

He's never seen Grace like this. Sure, he's seen her in a temper before, but now it's like she's come alive right before his eyes, her cheeks flushed, eyes bright with a passion he knew was there but never actually saw before now.

"I guess you must really love this place, huh?" he says after a moment's hesitation.

Their knees are already brushing together, an inevitability in this place where space is at a premium, and for a moment he wonders if she can feel it or if she was too caught up in what she was saying to notice just how close into his personal space she got with her impassioned little speech. She laughs, looks right into his eyes.

"Is that all you've got?" she asks softly. She puts one hand on his knee, and his gaze flicks down and back up. "Tell me, Jensen, what you really felt the first time you were out there. I saw you, don't forget."

Her excitement is infectious, and if he hadn't already been blushing before he'd definitely be doing so now. "I don't know... I mean, you've been there too, right?" he finds himself stammering just a little. "It's surreal, like everything is a little brighter, a little more intense, you know? I don't...I mean, I feel alive when I'm out there, and when I come back here it feels like none of this is really real anymore, like what's out there is so much bigger and more important than anything else. I'm not explaining this right."

"No, you're explaining it exactly right," she says, her tone still soft in spite of the heat in her words, and he thinks she might be moving her hand, but he's too busy staring at her mouth and he can't feel anything she's doing. "But that's one of the pitfalls of being an avatar driver. Everything out there is so much more intense than whatever it is we feel in here, that we forget that we're attached to these bodies too."

Jensen shifts in his chair, suddenly all too aware of her breath against his face. There's a hint of sweetness under the cigarette smoke, and the effect isn't unpleasant, just not what he was expecting. He starts a little as her hand travels to where he can definitely feel it. Her lips curl into a smile.

"I was wondering if that spinal injury had affected you like that."

He clears his throat, a little annoyed at being treated like a horny teenager out on his first date in the back of his father's car, but more than a little aroused too. "Yeah, no. No, everything's in perfect working order, thank you for asking."

Her smile widens at that. "Aren't you bashful all of a sudden? What, are you expecting me to believe that you've never been propositioned by a woman before? Or," she silences him when he starts to protest, "is it that you haven't been with anyone since you were wounded?" He stays silent at that, and she nods. "I see."

"Do you?"

"I think I get it."

"It's not like..." he fumbles for his words, flushed now with irritation as much as with arousal and embarrassment, and damn if the whole combination isn't making him even harder than he was, which isn't exactly helping. "I was in too much pain for the first few months, and then there was rehab and I was exhausted all the time, and then Tommy died..."

"And then you were literally frozen for six years and came directly here. So, if I calculate this right, you haven't been laid in over seven years?"

He bursts out laughing at that. "Jesus, that's way too long!" he says, and before either of them can change their minds he leans forward and hauls her into his lap, knees resting uncomfortably to either side of his thighs. She lets out a startled yelp but laughs as well, trying to keep her balance, grabbing onto his shoulders so as not to fall backward onto the floor.

"Don't take much convincing, do you?"

He's already wheeling himself backward toward the living quarters. God only knows where Norm is, but Jensen figures that he must be far enough away that this isn't going to attract his attention, at least not right away. The wheels of his chair hit the bunk backward, and Grace slithers off his lap, taking his t-shirt with her in one lithe motion.

"Hey!" he grins at her, pulls himself off the chair with both arms, and her eyes rake appreciatively over the tattoos he has on them. He beckons to her. "You want help with those clothes, you're going to have to come to me," he points out.

In a second she's in his lap again, one hand behind his head, the other cupping his chin just below the ear, licking her way over his lips, tongue pushing, demanding entrance. He's only happy enough to comply, bringing up one hand to press against her back between her shoulder blades, holding her close, using his other hand to brace himself so he won't just fall over. She breaks off the kiss a moment later, mouths her way down his neck, pausing to bite and suck at his collarbone. She shoves at him a little, hands moving down over his back and around to his stomach, thumbs smoothing themselves over his pectorals, toying with him, until he gets the message and lets her put him on his back on the bed. She grins, licks her lips as he busies himself unzipping the cotton sweater she likes to wear under her lab coat.

"You're lucky I like to top, Marine," she purrs.

"Lucky, yeah, that's what this is," he jokes, feeling her hips buck a little as his hands travel below the waistband of her pants, tugging them down along her thighs.

He pauses to admire the smooth expanse of skin there as she slides out of her top and leans over him again for another searing kiss, and he finds that not even seven years is enough time to get entirely out of practice at unfastening bra clasps.

"You're obviously an old hand at this," she teases, moving against him just enough that the fabric of his own pants causes a light friction that's just this side of intolerable, good and yet miles away from enough, and he can't quite get the leverage he needs in order to get more. "I hope you're not going to disappoint after this."

He lets out a frustrated grunt. "Try me and see..."

"Oh, a challenge. I like that."

"Christ," he groans, but he obligingly lifts himself up to catch her nipple gently between his teeth, letting the tip of his tongue play with it gently, enjoying the sharp intake of breath the gesture provokes. He can't quite get enough leverage to move her —nothing about this works exactly the way he remembers, which is frustrating enough— but she seems happy to take the lead and strip them both of what's left of their clothes, pulling away from him a little reluctantly in order to do so.

Before he knows it she's kneeling between his legs, nudging them apart with her knees, watching him a little bit the way he imagines she might watch a particularly fascinating specimen of animal in the forest, waiting to see what he's going to do, how he's going to react. Judging by her expression, though, so far it seems she likes what she sees.

"So has it really been seven years since you've been with a woman?" She slides one hand down over his dick, thumb moving lightly over the head as it twitches in her grasp, then moves her hand even lower down to play lightly with his balls, moving them between her fingers.

He squirms a little, wants nothing more than to move against her hand, and lets out a small, frustrated sound before he can help himself. "With a woman? Longer than that—Jesus!" he throws his head back with a strangled moan as she bends over him and swallows him down like his dick is the most appetizing thing she's seen in months, and for all he knows it might well be. For what feels like forever but is realistically only a few minutes all he's aware of is hot, wet heat enveloping him, the feel of her tongue sliding and swirling, probing and sucking, until all that's coming out of his mouth is a string of words each filthier than the last.

She comes up for air with a filthy-sounding pop, her lips cherry-red and glistening. "More than that with a woman?" she asks, and for a second he has no idea what she's even talking about, can't figure out how she's still capable of rational thought. "But only seven years since you got laid. Well, aren't you full of surprises, Marine."

He rolls his eyes, sits up just enough to get a bit of leverage to pull her close, so that she's straddling his hips. When he slides a hand between her legs, though, he finds her more than ready, slick and hot, and she arches into his touch willingly.

"You talk way too much," he tells her as a small moan spills from her lips. "I can't believe you're still thinking."

She thrusts against his hand as he works his fingers deeper, thumb tangling in the damp hair curling there, her own fingers digging into his shoulders for purchase. "You going to find a way to shut me up, then, Marine?"

"I just might, at that," he uses his free hand to cup her neck, pulls her in for a kiss, can taste a hint of bitter pre-come on her tongue.

He crooks his fingers, uses every trick he knows to make her come undone, to coax sounds from her throat that tell him he hasn't lost his touch at this. It doesn't take long before her face flushes bright red and she jerks and shudders against him, moaning and gasping and writhing on his fingers, her nails leaving marks in the skin above his tattoos.

"I take it back," she pants, still moving against him even once the aftershocks are over. "You're definitely not a disappointment."

"You're still talking," he points out, "so that means we're not done."

The follow-up is more awkward than he's used to. There was a time when he simply would have flipped her onto her back, but there's no way he can do that now. Instead she inches backward, lets herself slide down, impaling herself on his cock until he's enveloped in tight, slick heat. For a second she lets her head fall back, eyes closed, getting used to the feeling, and a drop of sweat trickles between her breasts, still heaving with each panting breath. He reaches up with one hand, wipes it away with the pad of his thumb, and she takes that as her signal to start moving, the lean muscles in her thighs clenching with every move. There's nothing now but the sound of their breathing, the quiet sound of skin against skin, the ever-increasing beat of his heart, pulse thrumming in his ears until it's all he can hear. His eyes close in spite of himself, head thrown back against his pillows, hands wrapped around Grace's hips to keep her steady as she fucks herself readily and hard on his cock. He hears her cry out, feels her clench convulsively around him, riding him through her second orgasm, does his best to keep moving for her until he feels her relax again, slumping a little as she tries to catch her breath. She slides off him and he doesn't quite whimper at the loss of contact, but it's a near thing until he feels her hand again, grasping his shaft, thoroughly slicked now from her riding him. It doesn't take much, barely a few quick jerks before he's gasping and coming with a quiet groan, spilling over her hand and himself in a heated rush.

When he opens his eyes again Grace is already reaching for her pants, smoothing the sweaty hair back from her face, although she looks pretty pleased with herself.

He takes a breath. "So that's it? Wham, bam, thank you ma'am?" he jokes lamely, feeling more than a little exposed like this, splayed out on his bed like she wants him on display, like some animal she's hunted down.

She grins. "The day is young, kid. There's still work to do. Don't tell me you expect flowers and cuddling?"

He snorts, groping for his pants which have landed in a puddle on the floor next to the bed. It's awkward, but he manages to hook a finger in the elastic band and pull them to him. "Romantic. No, I'm good, but usually I find women want more than just that."

She's already zipping up her cardigan. "Well, when we get back to base I might demand chocolate, except that there is none in this place. Until then, around here there's not much to be had in terms of privacy, and I don't know about you, but I don't especially feel like hanging around and having to explain this to Spellman, do you?"

Jensen rolls his eyes, yanks his pants up roughly around his hips, already feeling better with an extra layer between him and the outside world. "Don't think so. You make a habit of sleeping with the avatar drivers, just give 'em a test drive to see, or should I be flattered?"

She winks at him. "What do _you_ think, Marine?"

And with that, she's gone.

* * *

"Try again."

"You know, I would pay a lot of money never to hear those words again," Jensen mutters, picking himself out of the mud for what feels like the fifteenth or sixteenth time in almost as many minutes.

"Your money is worth nothing to me. Try again," Jared stands over him with an infuriating smirk on his face.

It's not the getting on the direhorse that's the problem. In fact, Jensen has done it so many times by now that he's actually pretty graceful at it. It's the whole bond thing that he can't get used to. _Tsaheylu_ , as the Na'vi call it, is something not even Grace and Norm together have been able to explain to him, beyond the fact that they know it exists and that it's something specific to Na'vi physiology. The simple reason for that, of course, is that they've never experienced it themselves, although it seems to Jensen like every Na'vi over the age of infancy has experienced some form of it. To make matters worse, Jared either can't or won't explain it to him further than what he's already attempted, which hasn't exactly improved the quality of their relationship. Jensen pushes, Jared resisted, and it came close to getting unpleasant until they both gave a little ground before things got out of hand. They've reached a sort of détente now, but it's still awkward and stiff between them most of the time, even when Jared lets himself relax a little and joke around.

With a sigh Jensen gets to his feet again, folds his arms and stares balefully at the direhorse, which is grazing impassively on a tuft of grass. "I'm missing something," he tries again. "I don't get how you don't get totally overwhelmed when you form the bond. When I'm up there it's all sounds and smells and seeing things that are at totally the wrong angle. I mean, how do you make it all make sense so you don't fall off? Or, you know, puke?"

"Puke?"

"Throw up," Jensen explains. "Sick to your stomach."

Jared tilts his head. "It gives you that sensation?" He seems honestly shocked.

"Yeah. It's like being turned upside down."

Jared catches the direhorse by its bridle, frowns as he rubs its nose, obviously mulling over what Jensen just said, chewing on his lip. Finally he looks up at Jensen, considering. "We will try something else. You mount," he steps back, gestures to the direhorse.

"Here we go again," Jensen springs onto the direhorse's back, settles himself comfortably and looks to Jared for whatever new thing he's going to try. Whatever it is, he figures at least it'll be different than what they've been doing over and over again for hours with no success. "What now, _sensei?_ "

Jared doesn't respond to the unknown word, but simply steps closer to him. "Now you close your eyes, and you do not listen to anything but me."

"Uh, that last part is kind of hard."

"Try," comes the curt command.

"Right, okay, yes. Sure." He sees Jared looking at him expectantly, so he closes his eyes, feeling a little off-balance, the direhorse's flanks rising and falling beneath his legs. Jared's hand brushes against his wrist, startling him a little, then moves to take his braid just as carefully as the first time he touched it, and Jensen shivers a little.

"Stay very still. When you form the bond, you think of nothing at all. You breathe, same as A'lai. Feel her breath in you, feel her legs like yours. See what A'lai sees, only."

Jensen nods, a little breathless, and this time while the sudden influx of sensations is just as shocking as ever, with his eyes closed and all his attention focused simply on breathing and feeling the direhorse beneath him it's no longer as disorienting. He lurches a little bit, catches himself with one hand against the direhorse's neck, and is instantly rewarded with a faint feeling of pleasure. When he moves his hand, petting the direhorse, the feeling intensifies, and he lets out a small laugh.

"Wow."

"Now you feel A'lai's heart," Jared says softly, and Jensen hears his voice as though it's coming from several directions, the words clear in his ears and the voice gentle in his mind as the direhorse recognizes it as an ally. "See what she sees, then show her what you see."

The world comes back, bit by bit, colour by colour, until Jensen feels confident enough to open his eyes. It's strange, but he stays upright, pushes back against the images crowding and clamouring for his attention. The direhorse shifts under him, and he can feel her anticipation, her desire to be told by her rider what he wants of her.

"Now, you may tell her where to go."

"Okay, forward!" he says, thrilled at the progress he's made.

The mare darts forward and the whole world tilts again and before he knows it he's landed ass over teakettle in the mud again. He rolls to his feet, laughing in spite of himself, looks up to see Jared coming toward him, a smile spreading over his face.

"Okay, so maybe I got a little ahead of myself there," he concedes, but Jared claps him on the shoulder, and he laughs harder, a little giddy with the notion that he might be able to do this after all. "What made you change your mind?"

Jared gives him another one of those looks that suggests he has no idea where Jensen comes up with the weird things that come out of his mouth, but he tries to answer anyway. "You could not see," he says, as though that explains everything.

Jensen resists the urge to drop his face into his hands in utter despair. "What do you mean?"

The frustrated expression on Jared's face is almost comical, but Jensen understands exactly how he feels. Jared's English is a thousand times better than Jensen's Na'vi, but it's still limited, and it's hard enough to communicate the basics without having to go into complicated quasi-metaphysical stuff like what the Na'vi mean by "seeing" something. Norm tried to explain to him on a day when he was being less pissy than usual.

"It's more than just looking, than seeing what's in front of you. When someone says ' _Oel ngati kmeie_ ,' they're not just saying 'I see you,' they're saying 'I see into you, I acknowledge you as your true self.' Do you get it?"

"I think so," he'd replied, and at the time he thought he had, the same way he thought he got it the first time he said it to Jared, but now he's not so sure.

When you ride the direhorse, you do not see," Jared says again, as though that explains everything. "You see only through your eyes and not through hers. If you close your eyes, then you learn to see as she does. Then you open your eyes, and you learn to see together. It is like...like you are born blind, but Eywa gives you back your eyes when you are grown."

Jensen thinks about it for a second. "Right. So it's like sensory overload."

"I don't know what that means."

"I was seeing more things than I'm used to seeing all at once."

"Yes," Jared nods enthusiastically, and Jensen can't help but grin, now that they're obviously on the same page about this.

"Okay, I'mma try again," he says, bounces back onto the direhorse's back before Jared so much as has time even to turn around.

He closes his eyes, brings his queue around, feels the now-familiar electrical jolt as he forms the bond with A'lai. The world comes to life in a kaleidoscope of vaguely-familiar colours and scents, subtly different now that he's perceiving them through A'lai's senses instead of his own. This time, though, when he opens his eyes, he's ready. It's strange, still disorienting, but now he thinks he understands. It's not about seeing one or the other, it's about both, about taking what he sees and showing it to the direhorse, showing her what he wants.

"Okay, girl. Go!"

He urges her forward with his knees and his mind, and when she takes off at a canter it feels as though he's flying.

* * *

The days start going by increasingly quickly. Jensen spends most of his time trying to keep up with Jared's boundless energy, even in the completely healthy body of his own avatar. Even by Na'vi standards, he quickly realizes, Jared is exceptionally quick and strong and nimble. He's a good head taller than most of them, with broad muscles in his back and shoulders, powerful legs and strong arms. He wields his longbow like it's nothing, can break the back of a coyote with one blow if he has to —though Jensen hasn't seen him do anything of the sort since the night they met, when Jared saved his life.

The flip side, of course, is that Jared seems to have little to no patience or understanding for physical limitations. The Na'vi don't appear to get sick much, as far as Jensen can tell, and with the carbon fibre that naturally reinforces their bones, they don't get injured easily either. The first time Jared throws himself with a maniacal whoop off the top of one of Pandora's enormous trees Jensen just about has a heart attack until he sees that Jared is actually using the huge leaves of another nearby tree to break his fall, tumbling gracefully from one to the next until he reaches the ground. Jensen swallows hard when Jared yells at him to follow, has to force himself not to close his eyes before launching himself into the air. His own fall is a whole lot less graceful than Jared's, leaving him lying in a tangled heap of limbs at the base of the tree, but he's pleasantly surprised to find that he made it all the way down without breaking his neck or any other important limbs.

"So what do you do when you hurt yourself?" he asks later on, when his heart rate has returned to normal. They're sitting on another spiralling branch in a tree maybe five clicks away, which Jared apparently decided to climb on a whim, but which offers a breathtaking view of a deep valley, shrouded in mist.

Jared shrugs, like he doesn't know what the question even means. "We have a healer."

"But you live in a giant tree. I mean, what if the person can't walk anymore?"

"Then they are carried."

"No, I mean, what if they're paralysed? If they can't walk ever again?"

Jared turns his head, expression quizzical. "I have not known this in my village. I suppose we would care for them. Our elders don't leave Home Tree much —they stay in their homes and help with things other than the hunt. With the weaving and tanning and painting." When Jensen stays silent after that, he gives him a shrewd look. "You ask this for a reason?"

"I was just wondering."

"You know someone who is like this," Jared's too insightful for his own good, Jensen has noticed. "Someone who doesn't walk. You say your brother is dead, and so you dreamwalk for him?"

"That's right."

"So your brother isn't the one who doesn't walk."

"No, it's me. I mean, my human body is paralysed from the waist down." It feels strange saying it aloud. When he's human, it's so obvious that it doesn't need to be said, and it's never been relevant when he's been in the link, his psyche housed in a perfectly sound body. Jared doesn't seem perturbed, though, merely curious.

"Is it strange, walking now?"

He shakes his head. "No. It's stranger to go back and not be able to walk. I used to be able to when I was...I mean, I wasn't always a paraplegic."

"I don't know this word. It means that you aren't able to walk?"

Jensen nods. "Right."

Jared thinks about it for a while, which is pretty unusual. Even in the short time Jensen has come to know him, Jared has never been one for over-thinking things, preferring to throw caution to the winds and simply throw himself into the thick of things.

"Is this why you become a Dreamwalker? So that you have a body that is whole?"

"No," he protests, maybe a little too quickly. "I mean, no, not really. I didn't think about that when I signed up. It's just...it's hard to explain. It was meant to be my brother, you know."

"Yes."

"But making a body like this, it's expensive for us. It costs money," he says, knowing that the Na'vi understand the concept of money even if they don't have any of their own. "So they didn't want to, well, waste it, I guess. So they asked me to come, and they're paying me a lot of money to do it, too."

"You do this only for money?"

It's the first time they've had this discussion directly like this. Jensen feels oddly nettled by the idea that his motivations are only mercenary, even if he threw the very same statement in Norm's face before. Hearing it like this, though, it feels cheap.

"Not only for that, but yeah. You don't have that here, but back where I come from, things are hard. There aren't many trees left, there isn't enough food or shelter for everyone. People are poor. My family is, too. They're living on the farm where I grew up, but the soil is contaminated now —they can't grow anything on it anymore and they can't sell it or leave it behind, because they have nowhere else to go. So they're stuck, unless I send back enough money for them to get out."

He can tell Jared doesn't really understand half of what he's saying, and how could he? Sitting here on a tree that's ten times the size of the Ackles' farmhouse, overlooking a thousand similar trees, it's hard to imagine a world in which not only are the trees stunted, diminished versions of these, but in which humans outnumber the trees about a thousand to one. Sometimes Jensen himself has trouble remembering it, remembering why he's here at all. He doesn't remember the last time he went home, saw his parents. He has a vision of his Mama standing out on the dry, cracked ground in front of the farm, hair coming out of her braid in wisps. She gave him a hug that last time, her expression calm and a little sad, wonders if she still looks like that now, all these years later, or if all that time spent living on poisoned ground has aged her prematurely. He rubs at his kneecap with one hand, enjoying the fact that he can feel the touch, that his leg responds to the external stimulus. In a few hours he has to go back, and every day he looks forward to it less.

Jared is still looking at him, staring so intently that it's uncomfortable. "What?"

Jared shakes his head. "I don't see you."

"What do you mean? I'm right here." Jensen doesn't roll his eyes, because he's pretty sure that's a sure-fire recipe for giving offence. He knows what Jared means, but the idea that Jared doesn't think he's real...it makes his gut twist in a way he doesn't like at all.

"No, I mean that I don't see you," Jared repeats with more emphasis. "How can I know who you are when all I see is the body in which you dream walk? It is like becoming friends with a..." he casts about for a word, and fails. "The picture you see on the water's surface."

"A reflection?" Jensen suggests, and gets a perplexed look. "It's the image of yourself when you look into water, or a mirror. Not that you have mirrors, but maybe Grace showed you one?"

"A reflection," Jared agrees. "You see me, but I see only your reflection."

Jensen bites the inside of his cheek, because what is there to say to that? Jared is never going to know the 'real' him, because the 'real' him can't breathe the air out here, and even with a re-breather unit he still wouldn't be able to get around in his wheelchair. The 'real' him is all but useless in his own world, and definitely useless in this one where there's no such thing as political correctness and obligatory access ramps. "We should be getting back," he says finally. "Grace is going to have my head if I don't have my report in by this evening."

Jared nods, seemingly reluctantly, but he gets to his feet, pulls Jensen up by one arm. Jensen gets the feeling he does it just because he can, rather than because he feels that Jensen can't make his way around on his own. He's still not as sure-footed as a born Na'vi, but he's getting the hang of this moon and its strange gravity, and since he hasn't yet managed to kill himself he figures that's probably a good sign. Jensen allows himself one last glance over his shoulder at the sun setting over the valley, then follows Jared back along the tree tops toward home.

* * *

Jensen dreams of flying. The dreams had tapered off for a while when he first arrived on Pandora, replaced by the more regular anxiety dreams he was used to having before. Dreams in which he became lost in impenetrable mazes, wandering between walls that shifted and warped. Dreams in which he was being chased or in which he was running after something that grew every more distant. Now, though, while every waking moment is spent either in Jared's company or recording what he did in Jared's company, his sleeping hours are spent soaring high above even the tallest trees on Pandora.

He recognizes the landscapes now. They've always been the same: vast expanses of lush foliage thousands of feet below, dotted with white where the clouds hang lower than their wont. It's a heady feeling, up here so close to the sun. Jensen tilts his head back, eyes closed, letting the warmth of the rays bathe his face in stark contrast to the frigid air at these heights. Up here he's free the way he never was before, not even when he still had his legs, not even when he was still a kid chasing after his brother in the mud of their back yard, not a care in the world. Up here, nothing matters but him and the wind, him and the sun, him and the great bird he's riding.

The realization jolts him out of the dream, bringing him to his senses, drenched in a cold sweat. He sucks in a gulp of air, his chest burning from the effort, and finds himself staring into the morning-sour face of Norm Spellman.

"Breakfast in ten. Grace said if you weren't up in five she'd eat your share."

He nods, brings up a hand to scrub at his face, but Norm doesn't move from where he is.

"Having some interesting dreams, are we?"

Jensen's too out of it to decipher his tone. "Actually, I was dreaming about riding a banshee. I think. When I was driving the avatar, I mean. I was linked to it. Bonded to it."

"Well, aren't you special."

"Fuck you, Spellman," he says without any heat behind the words.

He's getting tired of Norm's pissiness, but there's not much he can do about it right now, so he just pushes himself upright, careful not to crack his skull on the bunk above him where Norm spends about half his nights. Jensen's pretty sure that he spends the other half of those nights in Trudy's bunk, but he finds he doesn't actually care all that much. Trudy's a good-looking girl, and he likes her, and if she wants to bed down with Norm, well, that's her decision. It's not like there are all that many opportunities to have sex around here, and the majority of the guys are either military or former military. He figures Trudy might want something a little different than what ninety percent of the guys in this place are able to offer her, and when he's not being an asshole Norm is actually a pretty nice guy and educated to boot.

"How about you dream a way of getting the Na'vi to cooperate with Grace again? Actually do something useful for once instead of screwing around out there. Or in here, for that matter."

"Excuse me?" Jensen pauses in the middle of moving his legs off the side of his bed, leans on both hands in order to look at Norm. "Just what the hell is your problem, Spellman?"

"You're my problem. The Na'vi obviously think they can use you for something, but it would be nice if you acted in good faith for just one day, and tried to help out our cause too. Instead all you're doing is dicking around. What do you think you're supposed to be doing out there?"

"It's way too early for this, and Jensen doesn't even have a cup of coffee to his name yet. "I'm supposed to be learning how to be like them."

"Well, you can't!" Norm snaps. "And the sooner you realize that, the better for all of us! Jesus Christ, Jensen, don't you get it? You're not here to live out your noble savage fantasies. You're not going to meet fucking Pocahontas and learn how to be one with the fucking forest! The Na'vi have a complex society, and all you're doing is waiting for Ìla'rey to show you how to bow hunt."

"The hell?" Jensen mutters. He has no idea where this is coming from. "Seriously, what crawled up your ass and died this morning, Spellman? You know what, never mind. Since you're obviously the expert on what I should be doing, why don't you give me your educated opinion? I'll even do you the courtesy of asking for it, since you're obviously dying to give it to me anyway."

Norm stalks toward the door, which would be more impressive if it took more than two steps to get there, then turns back. "You still don't get it. This isn't about you. It's not about me, either, for that matter. We're here for a reason, Jensen, and that reason is to learn whatever it is that the Na'vi have going on that's allowing them to thrive on this planet."

"I hate to break it to you, but that's not why I'm here."

Norm folds his arms over his chest. "You shock me. I suppose you're going to remind me how you're here for the money?"

He should have figured he'd get his own words thrown back at him eventually. "No, asswipe. The mission is to persuade the Na'vi to help us with the mining projects, so we can damned well help the billions of people we left back home. Or have you forgotten them, now that you live with only a few dozen humans?" Jensen spits, memories of his parents flashing through his mind. "Easy enough not to think of all of those people starving to death, or wasting away because the groundwater's been poisoned for so long. Or the ones packed ten to a room in government housing, sharing their food stamps because there isn't enough to go around. Did you forget about them?"

Norm has the grace to flush. "Of course not! But you can't tell me that saving our planet is worth destroying this one! You have no idea what digging under Home Tree could do to this place! You're too busy playing at hunter to look at it from a scientific point of view, to figure out what the repercussions might be."

"I'm not a scientist."

"And that's your problem right there. You're nothing but a soldier, a grunt who follows orders. You've got no capacity for critical thought, and that's what's needed here! That's why the program hired your brother and not you. They wanted a mind, not a gun. News flash: just because you're a convenient fuck for the boss―"

"You boys just about done with this little display of testosterone?" Grace asks drily from just outside the doorway, and Norm jumps guiltily.

"Uh, you heard that?"

"Dude, the _Na'vi_ heard that," Jensen says tiredly, hauling himself into his chair with a wince. "This place is tiny and, no offence, but your voice carries."

"Jensen, go get something to eat," Grace says carefully. "And eat all of it, you're losing too much weight for my liking. Norm, stick around. You and I are going to have a chat."

Norm is apparently feeling suicidal, because he actually opens his mouth to protest. "Look, if this is going to be a talk about how the Na'vi picked Ackles as their super-special human envoy and that I need to play nice―"

Grace arches an eyebrow at him before interrupting. "How about you don't presume to know what I want to talk to you about and do what I say?"

Jensen can't help but grin at that, feeling weirdly vindicated. Before he can so much as wheel himself out the door, though, Grace turns on him. "Quit smirking, Jensen. You're not getting off that easily, either. When you get back tonight, you and I are going to be going over your mission protocols. Like it or not, Norm made a good point. And go eat, for Christ's sake."

"Got it. Although, for the record I resent being labelled a 'convenient fuck.' I am way better than that." He wheels himself into the tiny kitchen area where Trudy is pulling some sort of egg wrap thing out of the microwave. She slides the plate in front of him, and he stares at the congealed mess with revulsion.

"Hey," Trudy shrugs, "I just heated it up, don't shoot the messenger. You gotta eat the whole thing, though, doc's orders."

"I'm gonna puke if I eat that. The Na'vi food is way better than this, even if it looks weird."

"Except we can't eat the Na'vi food, or most of it, anyway, and you can't eat only when you're driving your avatar, because your human body will waste away and die. So quit whining and don't puke. We don't have an unlimited supply of this stuff, you know. Hey," she bends over the table to look at him. "You okay? You can't let Norm get to you. He's just...he cares about his job, same as you; he just has a different way of thinking about it."

He forces a smile. "It's not that. I just have a headache from him going on at me before I had any coffee this morning."

It's more than a headache, but he doesn't see how that's relevant to his breakfast, and it's not like Trudy needs to know he's feeling off. He suppresses a small shiver, takes a bite of his egg wrap, swallows, manages not to throw up. The whole thing churns uncomfortably in his stomach when he's done, but it stays down, and the cup of instant coffee Trudy hands him afterward goes a long way to making him feel better.

By the time he's settling down on the link bed he's convinced himself that he's not actually feeling so bad anymore. Norm is the one setting up his link, expression mutinous, and Jensen figures Grace must have read him the riot act—quietly. He doesn't look at Jensen, keeps his eyes on the vital signs monitor, lips pressed together in a thin line.

"You feeling okay?" he asks, but the question is perfunctory, like he's not really expecting an answer, and Jensen doesn't see why he should give him extra ammunition in his own private war against everything Ackles today.

"I'm just dandy."

"Okay, then. Buckle up, cowboy, and try to stay in the saddle this time."

Jensen falls.

* * *

On a whim, Jensen decides to tell Jared about the dream he had about riding one of the banshees. Instead of laughing at him the way he expected, though, Jared simply looks a little pensive. Abruptly he stands, interrupting the last of their breakfast.

"Come, Jensen, I show you," he says instead.

"Show me what?"

"Come and I show you."

"Right. I really should know better than to ask questions like that," Jensen mutters under his breath, but he follows Jared's lead.

They leave Home Tree almost immediately, but instead of heading down through the spiralling inner columns of the tree Jared leads him up into the thick, twisting branches. The light which filters in so thinly near the ground is much brighter up here, bathing the trees in a healthy glow, the leaves tilting upward toward the sun's rays as though simply drinking in the light. The tree trunk is too narrow up here to move within it, but the branches grow outward in a spiral, like the spokes of a wheel, making it easy to climb ever higher. Finally Jared stops by a platform that looks man-made, composed of thick wood and intricately-woven vines and branches.

"Wait," he says simply, then turns his face up toward the last few branches above them, still thick enough to make the sunlight dapple on the surface of the platform, and utters a series of shrill, barking cries.

"What―" Jensen starts, but almost immediately there's an answering cry along with a booming sound like a parachute unfurling, or like the cracking of the sails on an old-fashioned ship before a great wind, and a huge banshee comes to land on the platform less than a foot away from where Jared is standing.

The creature is astounding up close. Jensen has seen one or two from afar, seen pictures of them in the books, but never from so close. It stares at Jensen with one glittering, beady eye, and beats its wings furiously in the air as Jared reaches up to stroke its lizard-like head, reaching into the pouch on his belt for a piece of dried meat. Jensen catches sight of a row of sharp, wicked-looking teeth as it snatches the meat from Jared's hand and gulps it down, tilting its head back to allow the morsel to slide down its gullet more easily.

"Holy shit," Jensen breathes, and Jared starts, as though he'd forgotten he was there.

"Do not look her in eye," he warns, and Jensen immediately drops his gaze. If there's one thing he's learned here, it's that not paying attention to what the Na'vi have to say about the animals will pretty much directly result in bodily harm to him.

Still, he finds his eye drawn to the beautiful, iridescent scales that cover the banshee's body, gleaming in the morning light, lets his gaze travel along the arch of its neck. Jared is stroking the lithe body with one large hand, murmuring under his breath. Then he grasps the end of his queue, forms the bond with the banshee like it's second-nature, right as Jensen watches. Jensen is almost tempted to look away, as though this is something too intimate to be watched, but Jared doesn't appear self-conscious about it. There's a leathery rustling sound from somewhere to the side, and suddenly Jensen is aware that there are banshees all around, almost entirely camouflaged among the foliage. He shivers.

"So, is this a nest?"

"No. _Meikran_ nest high up, on the rocks. This is..." Jared searches for a word, comes up empty. "The Omaticaya ride these, and so they stay here."

"An eyrie." Jensen surprises himself by knowing the word, wonders where the hell he picked it up. Probably Tommy at some point.

Jared shrugs, unable to confirm the word. "Ikran is not horse," he says instead. "Once _tsaheylu_ is made, _ikran_ will fly only with one hunter, until the end of life."

"The hunter's life, or the banshee's?"

"The _ikran's_ life."

"What happens if the hunter dies first?" It's morbid, but he's curious.

"The _ikran_ is set free to return to the mountains. She will not bond with another." Jared keeps stroking the banshee's neck for a moment longer, then pulls away, releasing her from the bond and letting her fly away in a loud flapping of wings. "When you become _taronyu_ —hunter— you must choose your own _ikran_ , and she will choose you. This is how it is done."

"And when's that?"

"When you are ready."

"And how do you know when you're ready?"

Jared smiles at him. "When your teacher tells you. Come, Jensen. I have something else to show you."

And with that he turns and disappears into the forest, leaving Jensen to either keep up or be left behind.

* * *

Jared leads him on the fastest foot chase Jensen has ever had to endure, jumping from tree to tree and ignoring all of Jensen's cries to slow down, already. Then with a wordless cry of joy he leaps into the air, arms akimbo, and plunges headfirst off what looks to Jensen like it might just be the edge of the world. _This is a test_ , he barely has time to think before he's following Jared over the edge with a scream of terror that turns into one of exhilaration as he finally catches sight of the huge waterfall roaring below him.

He hits the deep pool below with a resounding splash, plunges into the crystalline water. For a moment he loses all sense of direction, thrashes wildly until he breaks the surface with a whooping gasp, trying desperately to drag air into his lungs. The next thing he knows he's back under the water again, being held down by arms much larger and stronger than his own. When he emerges again, coughing and choking, Jared is laughing wildly, and Jensen, his initial panic fading, finds himself grinning right back.

"Asshole!" he growls, and throws himself at Jared, doing his best to pin him and give him a taste of his own medicine.

They roll and thrash under the waterfall, hair coming loose from their queues, shed their clothing after a few moments. Jensen has never seen Jared this way before, like nothing more than an overgrown kid, nothing of the slightly resentful man who's been reluctantly showing him the ways of the Na'vi. It takes a moment for Jensen to work up to following Jared's lead, but eventually he strips away his clothing, tosses it heedlessly toward the bank until there's nothing between him and the crystalline water.

Jared laughs, leads him on a dizzying chase through the water, ducking in and out of the waterfall and only breaking the surface of the water when he absolutely has to come up for air. He's beautiful like this, Jensen thinks in spite of himself when they pause to catch their breath, with rivulets of water streaming over his skin, and suddenly Jensen wants nothing more than to just lean over and lick the drops away. Jared is staring at him too, and for a second Jensen is tempted to act on the insane thought. Then a bird swoops over the pool with a loud cry, and the moment is broken. Jared laughs again, more quietly, and leads them both onto the bank where their clothes are strewn all over the place. His hair has come entirely free from its braid and is plastered to his shoulders. He looks younger, wilder, a little more carefree than Jensen has ever seen him.

"There is room for play as well as work," he answers Jensen's unanswered question as he pulls himself from the water ahead of him, giving Jensen a very good view of his muscled ass and legs. He turns to pull Jensen from the water, apparently completely unconcerned by the fact they're both naked as the day is long. Jensen forces himself not to squirm as Jared's eyes rake him up and down.

"You should make your _tswin_ to be tied again," he says a little haltingly, brushing the hair back from where it's clinging to Jensen's neck. Jensen doesn't bother correcting his grammar this time, too startled by the sensation of Jared's fingers against his skin. "It is not good for you to be unprotected."

"Oh, right," he reaches back, starts tugging a little awkwardly at his hair. It's not like he's ever bothered to learn the art of braiding, what with the Number 1 buzz cut being the hairstyle he's favoured for years. Even when he was a kid his hair was never more than a couple of inches long.

 

He struggles for a little longer until Jared gives an amused huff and pulls him closer by one shoulder. "Do you want me to help?" he asks, looking uncharacteristically self-conscious.

Jensen rolls his eyes at his own ineptitude. "If you don't mind. I'm no good at this. Where I come from guys don't have long hair. At least, not soldiers."

"Sit," Jared instructs him.

He kneels behind Jensen on the damp grass, the sun slowly drying the droplets of water from their skin. For a moment he hesitates, then very gently begins to tease out the worst of the knots in Jensen's hair with his fingers, smoothing it down his back. His touch is delicate, but it doesn't prevent Jensen from shivering a little every time his fingers come near the long exposed bundle of nerves that's usually protected by his braid. Jared gathers both the hair and the _tswin_ into his large hands, begins the simple process of binding it again, and Jensen digs his fingers into the ground, a little surprised when he realizes that the whole process has become more than a little arousing, with Jared's strong hands working the individual strands of hair and brushing against his scalp, tugging and moulding. Jared seems intent on his work, though, or if he's noticed Jensen's sudden little problem he doesn't say anything. When he's done he draws away, but Jensen catches him by the wrist.

"Yours needs some work too," he points out, glad that he's gotten himself more under control by then.

Jared swallows, nods, and Jensen wonders if maybe he wasn't wrong to read something else into this. He switches positions with him, kneeling in the soft grass of the riverbank, does his best to mimic what Jared was doing before. It's harder than it looks, even doing it for someone else, and after a few minutes his back starts to protest and he's pretty sure one foot is falling asleep, but he wouldn't trade this for the world. Jared is pliant under his hands, fully relaxed and trusting for the first time since they've spent time together, which only serves to reinforce the gap that existed between them before. He tries to be as gentle as possible when he finally begins braiding the hair around Jared's tswin, acutely aware now of just how sensitive it is, finds himself wondering if Jared is having the same reaction as he did. He's too afraid to look, although he's not sure if he's afraid that Jared is aroused, or that he isn't.

"All done," he says softly, letting Jared's braid fall against his back. He lets his hand linger on Jared's shoulder, though, brushes his fingers softly against the ridges of bone on Jared's spine, and is rewarded with a full-body shudder.

All at once Jared twists where he's sitting and in one sinuous motion is face-to-face with Jensen, their faces inches apart, and Jensen has to force himself not to blink or look away from those huge cat-like eyes that seem to be boring directly into his soul. He swallows hard.

"Jared?" his voice comes out thin, his throat closing up.

"I don't see you," Jared murmurs, bringing up a hand to stroke Jensen's jaw. "How do I know if this is real?"

"I'm here, aren't I?" Jensen objects quietly. "Why does it matter what my body looks like, as long as my mind is the same?"

Jared kisses him. It's tentative at first, hesitant, just a brush of lips, but the sensation is electrifying. Jensen pushes forward, has to grab onto Jared's shoulders to keep his balance, finds that his tail has moved to wrap itself around Jared's waist without his even having to think about it, that Jared's tail has done exactly the same thing. When Jared doesn't seem like he's going to do anything more than this, Jensen pushes again, licks at his lips, gently encouraging Jared to let him in. Their tongues meet as Jared's lips part, and Jensen tastes fruit whose name he doesn't know, the texture of Jared's mouth both alien and familiar, warm and welcoming and oh-so-right that he doesn't bother to suppress the small moan of pleasure that builds in his throat. After a moment, though, Jared breaks the kiss, pulling back, eyes wide, his expression suddenly uncertain.

Jensen swallows again. "Uh, I take it you don't usually do that?" For the first time it occurs to him that he knows absolutely nothing about Na'vi sexuality, that maybe they don't do the whole sex-between-people-of-the-same-sex thing. He might have just unwittingly caused a freaking diplomatic incident, except that he's pretty sure he's not the one who initiated this kiss.

Jared's hand is still on his jaw, his tail still around Jensen's waist, the tip twitching. "I don't understand your question. Was this not...do you not want this?"

"Oh, no, God, no it's not that. I just... uh." It's weird, having this conversation when he can still feel Jared's breath on his face. "I didn't think you, uh, were into guys."  
"I don't understand what you're saying."

This is getting frustrating. So much for euphemisms. "I mean, I thought that the Na'vi, you know, uh, that love and sex was maybe only between a man and a woman."

"Oh." Jared stops to consider this. "Is this how it is with the Sky People?"

Jensen shakes his head. "No. I mean, yes, mostly, but some of us do it a little differently. I just thought maybe you didn't, and I thought maybe I offended you."

Jared laughs, and his breath is sweet and warm again on Jensen's face. "I am the one who kissed you, Jensen."

Jensen grins, pulls back a little and rubs the back of his neck with his palm. His heart is thumping loudly in his chest. "Well, you wouldn't be the first guy to act on impulse and regret it later. I mean, what if I was corrupting an entire alien race? Grace would hand me my ass." For a split-second he wonders if he should be feeling guilty about Grace for a whole other reason, but it's not like she's been demanding roses or a lifetime commitment from him. Hell, they've had sex less than a handful of times, and while it's been good, it hasn't exactly been the most connected he's ever felt to someone. He suspects it's the same for her.

"I don't know most of these things that you say, even though I know the words," Jared screws up his nose in a way that makes Jensen want to kiss him even more soundly than before. Instead he just laughs and lets himself fall back onto the grassy bank with a contented sigh.

"It's okay. I don't understand myself most of the time."

Jared matches his laugh and lies next to him. "Maybe that is something we should work on. If you don't understand yourself, what hope do I have of learning?"

It's beautiful like this, peaceful. Jensen lies very still, letting the sun's rays soak into his skin, basking in the warmth of its glow and Jared's presence. It's easy, like this, to forget about everything that's waiting for him at the end of the day, the cold, sterile environment of the outpost. Eventually, though, the afternoon stretches out, and before the sun can sink too low in the sky, Jared stands up. "We should go back. The water still on our clothes will dry as we walk."

"Right." Jensen is still giddy, light-headed after lying in the sun. He barely notices the path they take to head back toward Home Tree, his heart skidding in his chest, his thoughts whirling so fast it almost takes his breath away. It's only when he stumbles over a protruding root and nearly falls that he realizes that he's actually physically dizzy. Jared turns, his expression suddenly worried.

"Jensen?"

He's never been clumsy in this body. Maybe not as nimble as Jared, but never uncoordinated. Jensen stares uncomprehendingly at his hands, has the dizzying sensation of falling even though he knows everything around him is still. He opens his mouth, finds that words are almost beyond him. All around there are flashes of brightly-coloured lights, sparking and swirling, and he barely has time to formulate one phrase before everything spirals out of control and he falls into darkness.

"Something's wrong..."


	4. The Hunter

**Part III —The Hunter**

When he opens his eyes, it's dark. The darkness isn't complete —he can make out the dim glow of instruments and monitors, which tells him he must be back in the lab, but it doesn't make sense. He should be staring up at the inside of his link bed, not the impersonal beige of the outpost ceiling. He tries to raise his head, and realises that it's throbbing mercilessly, his whole body weighted down with lead, his mouth dry. An alarm goes off somewhere to nearby, a shrill but steady beeping, and suddenly there's movement by his bedside. He turns his head a little, blinks until Grace's face comes into focus, but can't make his lips form the words all crowding to get out of his head.

"Easy, Marine," Grace says, and brushes her hand over his forehead in a gesture that's wholly uncharacteristic of her, almost motherly, fingers cool against his skin. "You back with us?"

His throat works, but he doesn't even have enough saliva in his mouth left to swallow. Grace presses a button and his bed lifts a little, then she holds a cup of water with a straw to his lips so he can sip at it slowly. It feels wonderful, cool and soothing, tastes delicious even though he knows objectively that it’s still the same distilled water they always drink. He chokes and coughs on the last mouthful, and she pulls the cup away.

"What happened?" It comes out as a croak, but he takes it as a victory anyway, given just how crappy he feels.

"I was hoping you could tell me. One minute you're in the link, the next your vital signs went haywire," Grace fusses with the empty cup on the table by his bed. "You had a seizure, which severed the link prematurely. My best guess, given the fever you’re running, is that you’ve got an infection and that something about your elevated body temperature screwed with the system."

"I thought there were safeguards?" He doesn't mean it to come out sounding like a reproach.

"There are," she says grimly. "But it won't come as a surprise when I tell you you're not exactly typical of our avatar drivers. All of the others are perfectly physically fit, no pre-existing neurological or physiological conditions. Looks like you hit the trifecta of criteria for things to go wrong with the link."

"Lucky me," Jensen mutters. The lighting is all wrong in here, he thinks muzzily, nothing like the natural sunlight outside. He thinks longingly of the bank by the waterfall, of how comfortable it was just to lie on the grass next to Jared... "Oh God, Jared!" he sits up abruptly, the monitors around him beeping harshly in protest. The last he'd seen of Jared was his startled face, eyes filled with alarm, just before everything went dark. "What happened? Did you talk to him?"

"Easy!" Grace plants both hands on his shoulders and forces him back down, and he's too tired to resist. "Everything's fine. Ìla'rey found one of our research parties and got word to us that your avatar was safe. We arranged to have it brought back here, since we don't know how long you're going to be out of the game." She fixes him with a look that's not entirely unkind. "So the million dollar question is, why didn’t you tell me you weren’t feeling well? There’s no way we’d have let you go into the link if you weren’t physically up for it."

Jensen chews on his lip, doesn't meet her eyes. "I don’t know. Stupid, I guess. I didn’t think it was a big deal. I’ve been sick before, it never made a difference when I was working."

Grace purses her lips in disapproval. "Yeah, well, there’s a big difference between wielding a gun and making a bioneural link with a fully functional body independent of your own, moron. Why do you think we have so many damned monitors to keep track of your vital signs?"

"Sorry," he mutters, eyes closing in spite of himself. He hasn’t felt this bad in a long time. Not since his days in the VA hospital, when even raising his head was an exercise in pain and exhaustion.

"Sorry ain’t going to cut it, kid. For now you’re getting off easy because you’re sick and we need you back on your feet—metaphorically speaking—as soon as possible. But you have to be straight with me after this. You can’t screw around with this technology, it’s literally life or death. So you lie back, let the antibiotics do their work, and when this is over you and I are going to have a chat about physical limitations and trusting your team to have your back."

He snorts quietly, thinking back to the argument from this morning. "Tell that to Spellman."

"You let me worry about Norm. Trust me, he’s being handled."

Startled by her tone, Jensen opens his eyes again. "What?"

"Go back to sleep," Grace says firmly. "The sooner you're recovered, the better."

He doesn’t have the energy to argue, lets his eyes close. He never hears her leave.

* * *

Jensen lapses into a series of confused dreams of fire and flying, until he finds himself stranded in the arid stretch of scrubby desert where he spent the most terrifying few hours of his life before coming to Pandora. He knows his team has been forced to leave him there, that it's not their choice to leave him exposed in the sun, spine laid open to the elements. He knows they'll come back for him, knows they have to wait until nightfall before they'll be able to mount a rescue for him. He knows all this, but it doesn't change anything, doesn't make the fear any less raw, the pain any less vivid. He digs his fingers into the crumbling sand, tries to drag himself along until the pain becomes blinding. It's more than he can endure, forcing him simply to lie there in a broken heap, his back on fire, every nerve ending singing in pain, and scream desperately at the empty sky.

 _"Don't leave me here! Guys, please! Don't leave me..."_

He comes awake with a start to find a hand shaking him gently by the arm. "Hey, Jensen, wake up," Norm is saying softly, his face mostly obscured in shadow. "You’re dreaming." Jensen pulls in a shaking breath, nods to show he’s awake, trying to make sense of his surroundings, and Norm pulls his hand away. "Uh, you okay now?"

"Manner of speaking," Jensen rasps. He feels like he’s being boiled alive and his head is still throbbing. "Why’re you here? Where’s Grace?"

"She’s doing a full diagnostic on your link bed, trying to figure out what went wrong, and she doesn’t want you left alone until your fever’s gone. Also," Norm ducks his head, blood suffusing his cheeks, "I, uh, wanted to apologize."

"What for?" Jensen’s confused. "Just because we fought about―"

"No, it’s not that. I mean, I was pissed, and it interfered with my job. I saw a fluctuation on the monitor before you went into the link, and I should have said something, stopped you."

He remembers now, like it's a movie he saw a long time ago. Someone else's memory. "You asked if I was okay, and I said yes, dude. Not your fault. Not like you can read my mind."

"No, but I can read vital signs, and yours were off even before you linked up. It’s my job to keep us all healthy and safe, and I dropped the ball because I was angry, and that was not only really shitty of me, but I put you in danger."

Jensen grins, even though it feels like his skull is trying to collapse in on itself. "I take it Grace ripped you a new one?"

Norm rolls his eyes, but returns the grin. "And how. Twice in one day, it's gotta be a record. I'm amazed I still have an ass to sit on. So… we’re cool, then?"

"Totally."

"You need anything? While I’m working off my guilt here?"

"Water’d be good." His throat is closing up, giving him the slightly panic-inducing sensation of not being able to swallow or breathe.

"You got it."

Norm refills the cup, holds it for him until he can't drink anymore, then obligingly lowers the bed again partway so Jensen can lie back. Jensen can't keep his eyes open, but he does manage a small smile.

"If I'd known nearly dying would get us back on an even keel...I'd have done it weeks back," he says, and is rewarded with a light smack to the shoulder.

"You're a real asshole, you know that?"

"It's what they pay me for."

Norm's voice goes uncharacteristically soft. "Yeah, I think it's more than that."

* * *

The infection doesn't improve after that, the fever continuing to burn like fire coursing through his veins. Jensen spends most of the time half-awake and trying not to toss on the really uncomfortable bed, each breath a struggle. When he's asleep he dreams of fire and falling, and when he's awake the room spins and shifts and blurs. Most of the time he's able to tell what's happening, but every so often the fever spikes and he's barely aware of his own voice, babbling nonsense to whoever might be around to listen to it. Finally, he awakens one morning to the sound of anxious voices nearby, and after a tense-sounding conversation whose subject he can't quite decipher, Grace slips into the room to stand next to his bed.

"Hey, Marine, you feeling up to a visitor?" She looks torn between worry and amusement. "Ìla'rey has been putting up an unholy fuss about all this, wanting to see for himself that you're okay. I think you scared him half to death when you collapsed."

Jensen swallows, his mouth suddenly dry. "Jared wants to see me?"

Grace rolls her eyes. "Yes, moron. And I'm minded to let him, if it means fostering good relations between us again. Besides, with the fever you're running I'm going to have to take you back to the base for a while, get you properly treated. What limited supplies we've got up here aren't cutting it. That, and we need to get your avatar back to base so it doesn't starve to death while you're not there to feed it. So it means you're not going to be seeing Ìla'rey again for a while, and from what I've seen neither one of you is going to enjoy that."

"I can't link up like this," Jensen protests weakly, though his heart soars at the thought that Grace might actually let him go back to the body that actually works, which is still at Home Tree according to Grace's latest news. Maybe, he thinks a little dazedly, he can just stay with Jared while his body recovers from whatever this stupid infection is.

"No, of course not," Grace dashes his hopes, "but I think we can reach a compromise. Ìla'rey is going to come here, instead. He says he can climb up, so you'd damned well better appreciate the effort he's making," she teases. "It'll be a tight fit, but if he ducks low enough he can probably fit in through the back way. While it won't be comfortable for him, he can breathe our atmosphere for a little while without it harming him."

Jensen shakes his head, regrets it when it only makes his headache worse and the whole room lurches. "It won't work. But you can take me outside. With a mask."

"Jensen, you can barely sit up on your own. No way are you going to be able to handle sitting in your wheelchair for that long."

"Stretcher, if we have to. He's, like, twice as tall as the doorway. You let him in here and he'll destroy something just by twitching his tail."

Grace makes a face, but he can see by her expression that he's won. "All right. We'll kill two birds with one stone. We'll evac you out right after he's seen you."

"Sure, whatever."

Jensen's suddenly too tired to keep his eyes open, drifts back into more unpleasant dreams. The dreams have begun to develop a pattern. Every time he finds himself flying, borne aloft on the back of one of the great mountain banshees, the wind whipping past. The feeling is incredible, exhilarating, and all Jensen wants is to simply stay like this forever. Soon, though, the air grows thick with smoke, and he realizes that the forest beneath him is on fire. He urges the banshee forward, chasing its shadow on the ground hundreds of feet below, until that shadow is swallowed by one ten times its size. Jensen twists to look up and catches sight only of a flash of colour –scarlet and yellow and blue– before he finds himself hurtling toward the ground. He never feels himself hit the ground in the dreams, but every time he finds himself sprawled on his back amidst the charred and smouldering forest, staring in horror at the burning remains of Home Tree. That's when he wakens every time with a scream bubbling up from his chest and threatening to choke him.

There's a great deal of fussing in order to get him prepped for transport, with lots of barked orders from Grace and harassed scurrying about from Norm while Trudy looks on in amusement. Eventually, though, Jensen finds himself securely strapped to a plastic stretcher, re-breather mask firmly in place attached to one of the larger-capacity exopacks. The world has been swimmy and odd-looking all morning, but Jensen can't really bring himself to care. Distantly he thinks it might be because the fever's higher, but there's nothing he can do about that right now. That's why they're going in the chopper, he tells himself with a laugh. He likes choppers.

There's someone looming over him. He blinks a little trying to clear his vision, but there's something in his way, making things blurry. He tries to pull it away but a huge hand closes around his wrist—half his arm, practically—and gently keeps him from yanking off his re-breather mask. Another set of hands, smaller ones, briskly ties his arm down with another strap.

"You must keep wearing that," Jared tells him seriously, his voice like the purring of a cat underneath the whirr of chopper blades. "You cannot breathe without it, and I would not like it if you died." He's staring at Jensen like he's the most fascinating puzzle he's ever encountered, and Jensen shivers a bit.

"You came."

Jared nods. "You are still sick."

"Looks that way." Jensen's eyes close for a moment before he forces them open again. He's so damned tired, he just wants to sleep, but Jared's here and it's important because he might not see him again. "Are you disappointed?"

That gets him a confused look. "Why would I be disappointed?"

His back is aching, but he's so firmly strapped down that he can't even shift to adjust the pressure on his shoulders. "I bet I look small like this."

He can't read Jared's expression. "You are very small, yes, like all the Sky People. I had not thought you were...like the clay after it has been fired."

"Glossy?" Jensen jokes weakly, grins at the annoyed expression on Jared’s face. "You should see your face…" he murmurs.

"I mean that it is easy to break."

"Delicate."

Jared nods. "It would be easy to hurt this body, the one which houses your soul."

"It's been broken for a while."

"Not broken," Jared lays a hand over Jensen's, the calloused skin surprisingly warm. Everyone else's hands have felt cold up until now. Jensen wonders vaguely if the Na'vi run hotter than humans and he just never paid attention, or if it's just because the fever's got him all twisted around. He feels his face pull into a smile under the mask, heart thumping uncomfortably against his ribs at the oddly tender look on Jared's face. "I will wait for your return," Jared says simply, and with that, he's gone.

Jensen can't even turn his head to see where Jared has gone, so he closes his eyes, waits for the tell-tale thump that will let him know when he's on board the chopper. He keeps his eyes closed throughout the trip back, fading in and out of consciousness, but by the time his stretcher is pulled out of the Samson he's closer to unconsciousness, barely able to make sense of what's happening to him. There are lights and voices, and he thinks he hears someone say his name, but he can’t quite figure out how to make his mouth form words anymore, let alone open his eyes. The voices get louder, a little more frantic, but it’s too tiring to try to decipher what they’re saying, so he just lets himself slip entirely into darkness.

* * *

It takes less than two days on base before Jensen's feeling more than halfway normal again. For whatever variables of 'normal' apply to him, anyway. He spends most of the time sleeping, but the dreams fade little by little and by the end of the first day he no longer feels like he's being boiled alive, at least, and sleeping feels less like falling into an endless pit of darkness. On the evening of the second day he opens his eyes to find Colonel Quaritch standing next to his bed in a position of parade rest. Jensen starts, struggles to sit up, ends up falling back onto his thin military-issue pillow. The medical staff are all conspicuously absent, though everything else in the med lab seems the same as usual. He wonders just how badly Quaritch really frightens them, finds that it's not a thought he enjoys entertaining.

"Sir?"

He can't read Quaritch's expression. "We've been missing your reports, Ackles. Last one was a ways back."

He nods, tries to swallow in spite of how dry his mouth still feels. "Got caught up, sir. I meant to, but I've never been good with that sort of thing —the recording stuff, I mean," he adds, hedging a little bit.

Quaritch's smile is grim. "Always a soldier, I guess. Never met one who enjoyed making reports or filling out forms, isn't that right?"

Jensen forces a laugh. "I guess so. I'm sorry, sir, it won't happen again."

"That’s good, especially when we’re so close to our goal. I thought you should know, I got word back from headquarters back on Earth. I got approval for your surgery: when you rotate out, you’ll be getting your legs back. Your real legs."

This should be the best news of Jensen’s life. He forces a smile. "That’s great, sir. Thank you."

"The doctors say you ought to be ready to get around tomorrow sometime, and ready to go back in the field by the end of the week. We're going to debrief you before that, see where we're at. Make sure Augustine hasn't completely melted your brain with her scientific hippy crap. Don't want you going native on us."

"No chance of that, sir," Jensen says, although his mind is flashing to Grace's face, lit up with enthusiasm during one of their conversations, holding a cigarette lightly between her fingers. To Jared, glistening with water, grinning madly at him from under the waterfall. He can feel his heart speed up just at the thought, is grateful that he's no longer hooked up to any of the monitors which might betray just what all this is doing to him. That's when it occurs to him that he might be lying to a superior officer for the first time in his life.

* * *

Mo'at interrupts Ìla'rey just as he is indulging in a very satisfying brown study. "What are you doing here, Ìla'rey?" she gestures to the broad platform of the _meikran_ eyrie.

He doesn't answer at first, not wanting to admit to her that he prefers the company of Zeizei to that of the rest of the tribe. He's been in no mood to listen to Tsu'tey's continued lectures about how he is putting himself and his future in jeopardy by playing nursemaid to one of the Sky People, especially not while Jensen is gone. Tsu'tey had been shocked when Ìla'rey rounded on him during what he probably considered important advice and punched him as hard as he could before stalking off. He regrets it now, of course. Tsu'tey has always been his best friend, but just the thought of him being cruel about Jensen had set something off in Ìla'rey that he hadn't suspected even existed there before. So for now he is keeping busy feeding scrap of meat to the ikran, enjoying the uncomplicated affection she holds for him, butting her head against his chest whenever he slows down in his all-important task. Finally, because he knows his mother is expecting an answer, he sighs and shrugs.

"I thought Zeizei could use some attention."

He can feel Mo'at smile behind him. "Tsu'tey's swollen nose says otherwise. I am here as your mother, Ìla'rey, not as your _tsahik_ , though if you want, I can be both." She moves forward to sit beside him a little stiffly. Like it or not, he thinks, she is growing old. "Is it the thought of Jensen that troubles you still?"

He ducks his head. "I can't hide anything from you, can I?"

"Of course not. Surely you don't still resent having to teach this man? I have seen you with him, and I have seen no anger."

"No, _sa'nu_ , I'm not angry."

She lays a hand on his shoulder. "What, then?"

He makes a helpless gesture. "I don't know. I wanted to see him, even before he was gone. We only ever see the Dream Walkers as they want us to see them, and how am I to truly see if he will not let me? You have seen what they are really like, the warriors in their armour and their machines."

"You think that Jensen is like the other human warriors."

"No, I don't believe that, but how was I to know if my belief was true or false?" he asks, his voice rising in spite of himself. Zeizei makes a noise of protest at the disturbance and, since it appears he is done feeding her scraps for the moment, leaps into the branches of the eyrie in a leathery rustle of wings. "I wanted to see, and _dok-tor_ Augustine allowed me to go. I think Jensen was pleased to see me, but before this he didn't want me to see him as he is."

"You think Jensen deliberately hid himself?"

He shakes his head. "I don't know what I think. But I saw, and he is... he is not what I expected. How can one soul inhabit two bodies? What am I seeing when he is here, dreamwalking? Is it him? Is it just something that seems to be him? I can't tell if it's real."

His mother is silent for a moment. "This is not really what's troubling you, is it? I have seen you with him, you have no doubts about his soul. You had no doubts until you went to see him in his human body. What is it about that which so bothers you?"

Ìla'rey sighs. He can never get anything past his mother. "He was so small, _sa'nu_ , barely larger than a child. I could have crushed his head with my hand."

"You sound surprised. You know that they are much smaller than we are, and weaker in body, if not in mind or spirit."

He fidgets, twisting his hands in his lap. "I was not expecting him to be so fragile. When we were coming back from the waterfall, he was perfectly well, and then suddenly he was gone. He just fell, as though an arrow had pierced cleanly through his heart, but without any blood. There was no life in the body at all. I expected...I expected to find all that life in his other body, the one which houses his soul, but he was —diminished."

"He is ill, my son. You have seen how illness affects people before."

She's right, of course she is, but he can't shake the terrible feeling of dread that overcame him for the second time as he knelt on the grass by Jensen's side. It was not difficult to see past the mask that allowed him to breathe, to see the glassy look in his eyes, to see how pale, how thin he was compared to the other humans around him. No matter how he tries to reason with himself, to tell himself that the human medicine will cure Jensen and he will come back, he can't banish the image from his mind. He's not used to seeing illness except in the very old, and the thought frightens him.

"What if he dies?"

"Then he dies," his mother says, retreating for a moment into her role as _tsahik_. "Death is not so terrible as you think. His energy will be reborn."

"I don't want him to die."

"You care for this man, _'evi?_ "

She hasn't called him child in years. "Is it possible, do you think _sa'nu_ , to truly love someone who is not from the same world?"

Mo'at puts her hands on his shoulders. "Oh, Ìlia..." She pauses, searching for words. "I don't believe so, no. His soul is not the same, it will not be reborn here, among the People. You cannot truly love someone that you cannot truly see. But he is your charge, your pupil, and your feelings are normal. Every teacher goes through this with their first student, and when he outgrows your tutelage you will be so proud and so happy, and your feelings will become what they are meant to be."

She doesn't understand. Not that he expected her to; he barely understands it himself. "What if he doesn't return?"

"We will deal with that when the time comes. There is no hurry. I know you are worried for him, but they will send word sooner or later, and in the meantime there is no reason for you to brood on these things over which you have no control. Come," she rises stiffly, leaning on his shoulders. "Help me with tonight's supper. It will at least take your mind off things."

* * *

"Hi Mom, hi Dad —I guess it's been a while." Jensen's hand twitches as he resists fiddling with the dial for the umpteenth time. "Thing is, we shipped out a while back to this outpost way up in the Hallelujah Mountains. You remember that vid we saw all those years ago about the floating mountains? Yeah, they're the same ones. Grac e—that's my boss— she didn't like all the military brass breathing down her neck here on base, so we packed up all our shit and moved to basically a glorified trailer park up in the mountains. Except, you know, the view was fantastic and the equipment was better. Food still sucks, though. I think maybe I told you about that the last time I sent you a message, except it's been so long I don't remember what I told you and what I didn't, and I didn't keep a copy of my message. I hate listening to myself, I sound stupid. I figure you'll forgive me for sounding stupid 'cause you're my parents," Jensen grins at the camera, can imagine his mother rolling his eyes at that and snapping at the vid screen to him not to be ridiculous, that he could never sound stupid no matter what he says.

"I don't even know how to begin telling you all the stuff I've done since the last time I sent you a message. This place is a hell of a trip, you know. It kind of messes with your mind, especially when you're driving an avatar. Tommy would have loved it...Anyway. I don't know if I told you about this last time, but I'm sort of unofficially becoming kind of the liaison between the Na'vi and the humans here, which is cool, except it makes me really nervous, too. The tribe we're dealing with, the Omaticaya, decided I need to learn all about them, so this one guy is showing me the ropes. He's got a name I can barely pronounce, but it translates to Jared in English. I think you'd like him. I mean, he's really something. He's a hunter, but they're not all hunters. I don't know what I was expecting when I got here, but it wasn't this —the vids and books make the Na'vi sound like, I don't know, those old stories about the Native Americans from before they tamed the Wild West or something. You know, all warriors and hunter-gatherers or whatever, that they're all in tune with nature and all that, except it's different than that, and I can't even explain it. Hell, maybe one day I'll ask Grace to send a recording to you because she can explain it better than I can."

Jensen shifts a little in his chair, realizes what he's doing and shifts back so that he's properly centred on the screen. "Jared's been showing me everything there is to know about the forest. He's been teaching me how to hunt, how to use those huge bows, but I haven't made a kill yet because he says the forest hasn't given permission, or whatever. Sometimes I have no idea what he's talking about —he's always going on about the flow of energy, the spirits of animals, tree-huggy crap like that except that I don't think it's crap, not really. I don't know about things back home on Earth but here, I don't know, it's all different. The People actually physically connect with part of the forest, anyway, and it's weird and intense and kind of mind-bending when you do it for the first time. It's like opening up your eyes after you've been blind all your life. Mostly I just got dizzy and fell a lot, which Jared thought was hilarious. I don't really understand most of it, but I'm learning.

"It's beautiful here, especially at night, although I don't get to go out at night all that much. I have to leave the avatar behind for a few hours so I can eat and sleep and make those stupid recordings of all my 'research' and stuff. You know, for the record, so we'll have it for later. I think Grace wants to write another book, but this time she wants me to work on it too, even though I've told her I'm no good at that sort of thing. Tommy would have been perfect for that..." he stops to clear his throat, wishes he'd thought to drink a glass of water before starting to record. He doesn't want to interrupt it now.

"I wish I had a way of showing you all the stuff I'm seeing. The vids just can't do it justice, even the really high-quality ones. The forest lights up at night, like it's covered in fireflies. You remember when we were kids and all those fireflies used to swarm out back in the fields? Tommy and I used to make lanterns by shoving as many of 'em into glass jars as possible, and we'd hang them up in our room and watch the shadows dance. The forest here is just like that, except it's a hundred thousand times bigger than that.There's a word for it —bioluminescence— but it sounds kind of scientific for something that beautiful. I get that I'm not really a poet or anything —the army doesn't exactly encourage that— but sometimes I think Grace would rather take a scalpel to what she sees instead of just seeing it for what it is. Don't tell Colonel Quaritch I said that, incidentally. He doesn't exactly like Grace or anything, but I don't think he'd be on board with my waxing poetical about the bioluminescent forest, you know? He doesn't strike me as the type." Jensen grins, but something twinges at the back of his mind at the thought that, maybe, his personal correspondence isn't as private as he'd like to think.

"So I'm supposed to be heading back out tomorrow, they just cleared me back for duty. I kind of got sick for a while there, but I'm fine now, all back to normal, so I don't want you to worry, okay? Well, as normal as I get, anyway. So I wanted to be sure that you guys are okay. I didn't hear anything back from you since the last time I sent a message, and… I don't know, maybe I'm worrying for nothing. Maybe there's a communication glitch, or something. I'm going to check with Shirley in administration to see if anything's up with that. Anyway, I hope that's what's happening. Look, if you get the chance, just send word through the relays, okay? It'll take a little time before I can get back to you, but I want to make sure you got all the credits I sent you. I don't want all this danger pay I've been accumulating to just disappear into the void, you know? I gotta go now, but...I love you, and, uh, I hope you're okay. Send me something back, would you? Even if it's just a couple of text messages. I miss you guys. Be safe."

He switches off the recording, pushes his chair away from his desk, lets his head sink into his hands with a sigh.

* * *

On the morning he's been cleared for active duty again Jensen is squirming with impatience. His wheelchair is parked next to the link bed and he can't bring himself to sit still. His whole body feels like it's crawling, like he's about to come out of his skin. He's been awake for hours, too wired to do anything except fidget, hasn't even been able to do so much as watch a vid on his own. He spent as much time as he could manage in the makeshift gym, lifting weights until his arms gave out and doing as many crunches as he could manage before he couldn't sit up anymore, then reluctantly gave up and made his way back to the lab.

He hasn't seen Jared in nearly two weeks, not properly since they shared that kiss. He remembers vaguely that Jared came to see him before he was evacuated back to base, but most of that is a blur, and every time he thinks about what Jared might have thought about that encounter his stomach threatens to empty itself of all its contents. It's not like Jared didn't know he was human, of course, but there's a whole world of difference between knowing something theoretically and knowing it for real, and he can't help but wonder if, knowing what he knows now, Jared's not going to be so disgusted that he's not going to want to have anything to do with him.

It's not like Jensen's been able to ask Grace or anyone about this, either. There aren't too many ways he can approach any of them and casually say something like, "Oh, you know how the Na'vi aren't completely heterosexual? How do you suppose they view interspecies relationships?" The whole thing feels like a disaster waiting to happen, especially given how things are between him and Grace. Or rather, how much things between them have changed. It's not like there's been that many opportunities for them to hook up since they've been back —at first Jensen was too sick, and then they all got busy trying to prep everything to go back out into the field. He gets the feeling Grace isn't really all that interested anymore, and frankly neither is he. He figures they both got it out of their systems, and if Grace doesn't want to talk about it, well, so much the better.

"Ready to get this show on the road?" Grace asks him about two seconds before he chickens out and makes a beeline for his quarters.

Jensen nods tightly, swings himself back up onto the link bed, carefully arranges his legs on the gel surface and lies back. Grace gives him a critical once-over.

"You've lost a lot of weight, Marine. We're going to have to put you on extra protein rations, or you're going to get sick again."

He makes a face. "Yuck."

"Yeah, well, beggars can't be choosers. You can't live on Na'vi food alone, you know. All right, strap in. Let's see if you've managed to forget everything in a single week."

"Funny."

"Shut up and lie still."

The lid comes down, and Jensen lets himself fall.

If he thought that the knots of anxiety twisting his stomach would magically stay behind in his human body, Jensen is sorely disappointed by the time he wakes up in his avatar. If anything, he's more nervous now, and ever sense seems to be heightened in this body. He barely looks out at the passing scenery as Trudy flies them back to the clearing where all of this started for him, clenching and unclenching his hands in his lap.

When they land, though, Jared is waiting, standing off to the side just at the tree line, and his wide, dimpled smile immediately makes the knot that had travelled up into Jensen's chest dissolve. Barely stopping to wave to Trudy, Jensen takes off at a run to go meet him, stops just short of where Jared is standing, suddenly more self-conscious than he's been in his entire life.

"Uh, hey."

Jared beams at him. "You are well?"

He nods, rubs the back of his neck. "Yeah, I'm better. I'm sorry about that, I didn't mean to put a crimp in your plans like that."

And, just like that, it's like no time at all has passed. Jared's face screws up in puzzlement. "I don't know that expression. Why are you sorry?"

"Uh, well, you know," Jensen flaps a hand vaguely. "I figured that this wasn't really what you had in mind, and..." he trails off as Jared stares at him like he's lost his mind. "What?"

"I don't understand why you are apologizing. The People apologize for when they have done someone a wrong. Are humans different?"

"Uh, no. No, that's about right."

"So you believe you have done something wrong by becoming sick?"

"Uh."

Jared puts both hands on Jensen's shoulders. "The People don't think sickness is your fault," he assures Jensen seriously, his expression so earnest that Jensen doesn't know whether to laugh or cry. "You don't need to say you are sorry for this."

Jensen huffs a laugh. "Yeah, okay. Thank you."

"It's a stupid belief. Sickness is not...on purpose. It is not wrong, it just is."

"Okay, okay, I get it. No apologizing."

Jared's smile reappears instantly. "Good, I am glad. Now come. We will start again with your learning."

Jensen takes a breath. "Yeah, about that... Jared... what happened at the waterfall. Do you... I mean, should we... what about it?"

Jared's smile falters a little. "Was it not what you wanted?"

"What? No! I mean, yes. Yes, I wanted it," Jensen's babbling, wants to kick himself except that his mouth is still working in spite of his better judgement. "I just...you came up to the outpost, and, well, you saw, and I was worried that, uh, that―" he stutters to a stop, his brain shutting down about two sentences too late into the process.

Jared runs his fingers through Jensen's hair. "I wished to see you."

Jensen nods, swallows. "I thought you might not like what you saw."

"I am not sure of what I saw," Jared admits after a moment. "You are not like the humans I have known. You are so small," he says, and Jensen remembers him saying the same thing atop the mountain.

"Hey, it's not the size that counts, it's what you do with it."

At that, Jared throws back his head and laughs.

* * *

"So, you and Ìla'rey?" Grace asks one evening.

They're both still linked up to their avatars, Jensen having returned for a day or so in order for the techs to run a bunch more tests on him and his avatar to make sure nothing was permanently damaged when he was sick. Now, though, the tests are over and he and Grace are taking advantage of a rare moment of peace and quiet to just sit and enjoy the outdoors before severing the link and going back to their duties.

Jensen twitches a bit at her question. He has the distinct and uncomfortable impression that he's blushing. "Me and Jared what?"

She sighs. "You should really try to pronounce his name properly."

"I am. He likes it when I call him Jared. He said so. I can say his name in Na'vi just fine, too."

"I'll leave it to Norm to teach you about the perils of cultural appropriation and whitewashing."

"I already got that lecture. Multiple times. He's very fond of it, I think he practises it in front of the mirror in the morning."

She laughs. "Poor Spellman. You should go easier on him."

"I like to think we bring out the best in each other."

"Don't think I haven't noticed you trying to deflect the question. We never exactly talked about this except that one time, and we were sort of busy with other things," she gives him a coy smile, "but I figure I should bring it up now. I'll admit that when we first met I didn't peg you for swinging both ways, Marine. You're definitely full of surprises."

He shrugs. "I don't exactly advertise it. The armed forces aren't nearly as tolerant as the recruitment officers lead you to believe. I didn't really want to spend all my time watching my back and checking my sheets and the insides of my boots while we were out on tour, you know? And that's just scratching the surface."

Grace nods, her expression a little sad. "What about your brother?"

"Like the proverbial arrow. Liked his women small, brunette and curvy in all the right places," Jensen grins at the memory. "He kept trying to set me up with guys until we had a drop-down drag-out fight about it because I didn't want to out myself to the military. Are you...okay with this?"

"What, that you bat for both teams?"

"No, I mean, about..." he makes an abortive gesture that halfway encompasses the both of them and most of the rainforest at the same time.

She laughs. "Would it hurt your feelings if I told you that it was fun but I wasn't looking for attachments?"

Jensen matches her laugh. "I think you know the answer to that. I...was just a little worried."

"No offence, Marine, but you're not exactly the kind of guy with whom I want to form a long-lasting, meaningful relationship. Nobody here is, and that's fine by me. That doesn't mean we can't engage in some kind of recreation in the meantime."

"None taken. But... I'm not really like that," he says, feeling his cheeks grow warm. "I mean, not if I'm, uh..."

"You're a one-horse kind of a guy, I get it. Which brings me back to my original point: you and Ìla'rey?"

Jensen sighs. "I don't know. It’s not like anything is really happening, except just the once, and that was right before I collapsed. We haven’t really discussed it since then. Not much, anyway. I don't think he knows what to do about this either. And if this is over-sharing, I'm going to point out that you're the one who insisted on my spilling my guts, here. For the record."

"Duly noted."

"First off, I don't even know if Jared feels the same way. I mean, yeah, he...there's obviously something. But how am I supposed to know if, you know, it's the same for the Na'vi as it is for us?"

"You think they don't know how to love?"

"Don't put words in my mouth!" Jensen snaps. "I never said that. I just...what if their way of loving someone isn't the same as ours? I'm in way over my head, here."

"Look, if this were anyone else, I'd have come down on you like a ton of bricks and told you to break this off. You're right: the Na'vi aren't like us in a lot of ways that count. For one thing, they tend to bond for life once they've made their choice. So either you're an experimentation for Ìla'rey, like with his friend Tsu'tey―"

"Jared slept with Tsu'tey?"

"When they were teenagers, sure," Grace confirms easily. "They're bonded friends. If Ìla'rey had been born a girl, they would be expected to bond as a couple, since Tsu'tey is going to be chief of the clan and Ìla'rey is going to be the _tsahik_. But since they can't reproduce together, they'll each be expected to marry and have children of their own, separately."

"So Jared has to marry a girl and father children." None of which he can do with Jensen, who's the wrong gender and, more importantly, the wrong species.

Grace's expression is an annoying mixture of compassion and knowingness. "Try not to fall too hard, either of you."

He snorts. "It's fine. He just likes the look of this body," he gestures to himself. "He keeps telling me I'm not real, anyway, that he can't see what I'm really like. Besides, there's like an expiry date on this whole thing anyway. I turn into a pumpkin at midnight, as last month's little adventure demonstrated so well."

"Not that you're bitter about any of this. You want out of this project, all you have to do is say so."

"Right. I think I've bonded with you enough," Jensen gets up, makes a show of brushing himself off. "I'm heading back in."

"You go on ahead," Grace tells him. "I'm going to stay out here a while longer. It's not every day you get to see stars like this."

Jensen pauses in the doorway. She's sitting with her back to him, silhouetted by the glow of the evening sky, head tilted back. She's beautiful like this, young and vibrant, her clothes making her look more like a college student than the veteran scientist Jensen has come to know over the past few months. He stays where he is for a long time, just leaning against the door frame, watching her, until finally he turns away and heads inside without a backward glance.

* * *

The forest is quiet when Jensen makes his first kill. He and Jared have been crouched, utterly still, for what feels like hours. Not for the first time Jensen is grateful for the military training that taught him how to stay in one position for endless stretches of time without giving himself away. The Na’vi have elevated it to an art form, but at least he’s got the basics down. That doesn’t make the waiting any easier, of course. The only good part is that this body has been built for endurance. He expected his legs or his ass to go numb, at the very least, but so far his muscles haven’t even begun to tire.

Just when he thinks he’s about to go nuts from boredom, a rustling in the undergrowth attracts his attention. He sees Jared’s ears perk up, suspects his own are doing the same thing, which is still kind of a trippy thought. The noise, so quiet he might not have heard it had he not been doing his very best impression of a statue for the past couple of hours, comes from a purple-skinned hexapede whose name he’s pretty sure both Jared and Grace have told him repeatedly but which he can’t help thinking of as an antelope. It steps into a clearing bathed in light, apparently unaware or unconcerned by his presence. It’s a very young buck, its antlers newly-formed, and it drops its head to nip at some low-growing leaves.

Jensen doesn’t look to Jared for approval on this. Jared told him he would know when the time was right, would know which of the animal spirits was calling to him. Looking at the animal now, Jensen thinks he knows what Jared was talking about. There’s a stillness in the air, a rightness to the whole moment. Slowly he brings up the bow lent to him by Jared, hands steady on the finely-carved wood, and takes aim. One breath, two, and on the third he lets fly with his arrow, watches it whistle across the clearing and catch the antelope in the breast, piercing its heart. The creature goes down with barely a sound, its legs buckling under it, blood oozing around Jensen’s arrow.

He’s on his feet in a flash, drawing his knife, lopes to the fallen animal. It’s dying, will be dead in moments, but there’s no need to prolong its suffering even that long, and so he plunges his knife into what would be the carotid artery if this was an animal on Earth, and carefully utters the phrase he learned from Jared.

" _Oel ngati kameie, ma tsmukan, ulte ngaru seiyi irayo. Ngari hu eywa salew tirea, tokx 'ì'awn slu Na'viyä hapxì_."

"A clean kill," Jared confirms quietly from behind him. "It means you are ready for _Iknimaya_."

" _Iknimaya?_ " Jensen racks his brain for the vocabulary. "Stairway to heaven?" Jared nods, and Jensen grins. "Seriously? If you tell me there’s a bustle in your hedgerow, I’m out of here."

"I don’t understand what that means."

"It’s not important." Jensen retrieves his arrow, stands and slings the antelope over his shoulder in order to bring it back to Home Tree. "So what happens now?"

"We will prepare the _yerik_ you have killed for the feast. You and the other young hunters will perform your last task before you are considered _taronyu._ "

"And that would be bonding with a banshee."

Jared flashes him a quick grin. "Yes."

* * *

Tsu’tey accompanies them on their ascent, along with two other teenagers from the tribe whose names Jensen never managed to catch. They’re obviously excited about their rite of passage, chattering to each other at a speed which takes Jensen’s breath away. He quickly gives up on trying to understand anything they say. Norm studied this language for years and still sounds stilted according to Grace and Jared, so Jensen figures that his own ability to string together a couple of sentences with a lot of effort is probably not a bad showing after only weeks of being around the Na’vi. Kind of like immersion Spanish, only way less boring, he thinks with a grin.

"Why do you smile?" Jared bumps his shoulder companionably on their way through the forest.

He shakes his head. "Just thinking of something back home. On Earth, I mean."

Something shifts in Jared’s expression. Before Jensen can so much as begin to try to identify what it might be it’s gone again, and Jared is off, leading the way along the winding path to the edge of the forest, all the way to the far side of the floating mountains. The landscape is different here than where the mobile outpost is stationed. For one thing, the mountains look far less —mountainous. These rock formations are what gave the mountains their name among the humans and the Na’vi alike — _Ramlìng_ , the floating mountains— and are nothing but huge boulders suspended in the air, covered in moss and lichen and joined together by huge vines as thick as tree trunks close to their bases and growing narrower the higher they climb. Water pours in an endless cascade down the rocks, sending up glittering spray in enormous clouds. Rainbows hang in perpetuity over the abyss here, the coloured light projecting against the rock in places, giving it an ethereal look.

"So, uh, where do the _meikran_ nest, exactly?" Jensen asks, although he has a sinking feeling he’s not going to like the answer.

"At the summit," Tsu’tey says curtly. He still doesn’t appear to have forgiven Jensen for intruding on Jared’s life, but he has made a few attempts to be at least civil with Jensen, which is pretty decent, all things considered. Jensen wonders, in light of Grace’s revelation, if Tsu’tey might not be a little jealous. If he and Jared were together when they were younger, it would explain why he would have a hate-on for anyone who looked like they might be taking his place. Even if it's not that, Jensen can understand being overprotective of your best friend, and he tries not to hold it against him too much, with varying levels of success.

"I was afraid you’d say that."

"Climb," Tsu’tey pokes Jensen between the shoulder blades, urging him toward the mountains.

It’s a very long climb. The ground grows further and further away, gradually disappears in a cloud of mist. After a while the whole world seems to fall away, leaving them walled in by cloud and sky, and the muscles in Jensen’s arms, legs and back burn from the strain.

"I have a friend who totally would have given us a lift," he mutters, only to get cuffed behind the head by Jared who pauses in his climb and deliberately leans down in order to do it. "Ow! Okay, jeez, I was kidding. You guys have no sense of humour."

" _Latsi!_ " Tsu’tey snaps.

"I’m going as fast as I can!"

It takes the better part of the day before they reach the narrow causeway of vines that will lead them to their destination. Its name in Na’vi is still unpronounceable as far as Jensen is concerned, but the humans have named it Mons Veritatis, which he supposes is pretty fitting. It’s not the tallest of the mountains by any stretch of the imagination, but it boasts a sheer face that plunges down for hundreds of feet at right angles to the ground. Near its summit, on a rocky outcropping is where the largest flock of banshees have established their rookery. The banshees mate in pairs, Jared explained to Jensen when he first asked, but tend to build their nests close together and share in the hunting and raising of the young. Jensen hears them long before he catches sight of the first banshee, and all the hunters slow their ascent before they come into view of the huge creatures. Disturbing the banshees in their nesting-place is asking to get killed, and Jensen has no trouble erring on the side of caution, here.

Tsu’tey gives him another small shove to get him to move. "Jensen should go first. Better he die and have it over with so the others can concentrate on their task."

"Thanks for the vote of confidence," Jensen can’t bring himself to put any real heat into the words. Tsu’tey is obviously trying to get a rise out of him, and maybe it’s part of the initiation, or maybe it’s yet another demonstration of just how determined Tsu’tey is to hate him, but either way he’s not going to give him the satisfaction. Not to mention that there are about two dozen really mean-looking banshees not fifteen feet away which have a prior claim on Jensen’s attention.

" _Tìyerkup skxawng_." Tsu’tey laughs, earning himself a glare from Jared, who probably feels like he has the monopoly on calling Jensen names.

" _Ftang nga!_ "

"It’s fine," Jensen waves Jared down, never taking his eyes. "I don’t need you to fight my battles for me. So which one of these bad boys—or girls—is the one I want?"

Jared steps up behind him and places both hands on Jensen’s shoulders. "Only female. You go in front and your _ikran_ will make herself known. You must move quick, quick. Only one chance."

"How will I know which one it is?"

"She will try to kill you," Jared claps him on the shoulder.

"Outstanding," Jensen mutters, then hefts the bolo that he made himself specifically for this purpose under Jared’s tutelage and steps forward out onto the rocky ledge.

The banshees immediately turn to face the intruder, hissing and baring their fangs. For a moment it feels like he’s surrounded by hundreds of gleaming eyes and teeth, barring his escape. He can hear Tsu’tey and the other two young warriors behind him laughing and jeering, the latter two no doubt trying to cover just how nervous they are, but the words are lost amidst the roaring of blood in his ears. There’s no way he’s going to be able to do this, Jensen thinks. All these goddamn birds look like they want to eat his liver. Then he turns his head, finds himself almost face to face with an _ikran_ with a huge wingspan, her scales mottled green and blue and yellow. She rears up on her hind legs, spreads her wings with an ear-splitting shriek, and just like that, he knows: she’s the one.

"Okay, sweetheart," Jensen clenches his teeth, adjusts his grip on the rope. "It’s you and me. Let’s dance!"

* * *

The banshee hisses at his approach, lunges at him, but Jensen is already moving, dodging to one side, the bolo whirling in his hands. He lets it fly, sees it whistle by the banshee’s snout, missing it by less than two inches. There’s a screech of frustration as the banshee’s jaws snap shut just short of slicing him clean in half, and Jensen dodges again, feints, times the next lunge. The bolo whistles through the air again, and this time the shot is clean. The leather thong catches the banshee’s snout and wraps around it, clamping its jaws together and giving him the opening he needs. It slashes at his stomach with its talons but he’s already swarming it, toppling it onto its side and wrapping both arms and then both legs around its thrashing neck as it hisses and screams and writhes.

" _Tsaheylu_ , Jensen!" Jared yells from off to the side. "Form the bond!"

It’s easier said than done, trying to join up his _tswin_ with the antenna-like appendage on the banshee. For one thing, it means having to let go of the banshee’s neck, staying on it using only his legs, and the next thing he knows Jensen has been ripped loose from his perch. He flails, tumbles backward, suddenly feels nothing but air beneath him, twists and scrabbles frantically at the sheer rock face. He can hear alarmed shouts from somewhere above him, manages to catch himself painfully against the rough surface of the cliff, the rock tearing at his fingers and knees. For a moment he hangs there, heart hammering against his ribs, blood singing in his ears, his whole body thrumming with terror and adrenaline. Then he finds a foothold, pulls himself back up onto the ledge and throws himself at the banshee without so much as pausing to catch his breath.

This time he takes the creature by surprise. It spreads its wings wide with an indignant shriek and tries to shake him off, but it’s too late. In one smooth movement he has joined them together, squeezes his eyes shut to ward off the first dizzying sensation of experiencing everything through the banshees senses as well as his own. In that instant, there is nothing else, nothing but him and his mount, they are one being, have only one purpose.

"The first flight seals the bond!" Jared calls out. "Do not wait!"

"You heard the man, come on!" Jensen tells the banshee.

He kicks his heels into the creature’s flanks, and there’s a flurry of wings as it throws itself headlong over the side of the cliff. For several terrifying seconds there’s nothing but shrieking and squawking in Jensen’s mind, crowding out all rational thought. It’s a whirl of images and alien sensations, of bestial anger and outrage at being dominated, and most of all the dizzying sensation of plummeting as they fall, the banshee scrabbling futilely at the rock face with wings and claws alike in its desperation to be free.

"Shut the hell up!" he yells, a little frantic at the thought of becoming nothing but a smear on the rocky ground.

To his surprise, the creature obeys, and his thoughts quieten immediately. He conjures an image of them flying, concentrates on it, digs his heels into the scaly leather, and is rewarded instantly when their freefall becomes controlled. The banshee spreads its wings with a boom of leather against air, levels out a few dozen feet further down than where they started, and gives a few steady flaps before finding a rising current of warm air upon which to glide. Jensen lets out a whoop of unabashed glee, lets go with one hand to execute a fist-pump.

"All right!"

There’s an answering scream from off to the side. When he turns his head he catches sight of Jared astride Zeizei, swooping down to meet him. Jared is grinning so wide that it looks as though his face might split in two at any moment, and Jensen can’t help but return the grin for all he’s worth. Then with another whoop of joy they both take off at top speed swooping far past the mountain range to go soar together above the treetops of Pandora.

* * *

"I keep forgetting to record on this thing," Jensen tells the camera. "I mean, other than the official grocery list reports I make when Grace makes me. She keeps telling me I need to keep up with my personal entries, but I don’t know, it feels kind of pointless. I mean, I don’t know why I would do it, it’s not like I ever come back and listen to myself blabber on about what I did three weeks ago. I’m too busy doing new stuff to go back and listen to the old stuff."

He sighs, rubs a hand over his face, the stubble on his chin rough against the skin of his palm. He doesn’t remember the last time he looked at himself properly in a mirror. "I don’t know. It’s weird. It’s like everything is backward now. Like, this life in here is the dream, and everything out there is what’s real. I know they’re both real, but it doesn’t feel like it anymore. Grace keeps telling me I have to stay grounded, that I have to remember that when I’m out there, I’m also still here, and that it’s the me that stays here that’s more important, but I’m not so sure about that anymore. In here, I’m not really living."

Jensen reaches for the button to switch off the camera. "Anyway, I gotta go. Tonight is the last step in becoming a hunter. I rode a banshee today, and that was the final test." He grins, relishing the memory of the wind rushing by as they flew, feeling the banshee’s heart beating in tandem with his. "I may not be much of a horse guy, but I was born to fly. I always knew I shoulda joined the air force, but this is way better. There’s going to be a feast for all the hunters who rode the banshees tonight. We’re going to eat our first kill and be initiated, except I’m not really sure what that means. Jared was kind of secretive about that. Guess I’ll find out soon enough."

With that, he powers down the camera and wheels himself back toward the link chamber.

* * *

It’s Jensen’s first time at an official Na’vi ceremony, and by the time Jared has finished explaining all the intricacies of protocol Jensen is feeling a little overwhelmed. It’s nothing too formal, but there are layers in the Na’vi hierarchy that he never even suspected existed, and each needs to be paid its proper respect. Jared laughs when Jensen confesses just how nervous he is, all while carefully applying white ceremonial paint to Jensen’s face.

"You will do well, Jensen," he says, dipping his fingers into the bowl of pigment. "The People know you are new to our ways, that you are learning. Tonight you will prove what you learned, and all will be well. Be still," he orders sternly when Jensen squirms under his touch.

They haven’t discussed the kiss at all, not since the first day upon Jensen’s return. Jared seemed certain that this was something he was okay with, at least, but Jensen can’t banish the conversation with Grace from his mind. He can’t tell if Jared’s been hurt by his reticence or if he’s relieved or if he just doesn’t care. Jared seems content to let the matter lie, and Jensen is too busy tying himself into knots over it to want to bring it up all on his own. He tries not to shiver as Jared’s fingers travel down his torso, painting increasingly elaborate designs over his chest and stomach. Finally Jared seems satisfied with his work, extends his hands —fingers still covered in white paint— for Jensen to take, and pulls him to his feet.

"Are you ready?"

"As I’ll ever be, I guess."

It’s been dark for over an hour already, and by the time Jensen and Jared arrive in the huge clearing at the foot of Home Tree where the Omaticaya hold their most important ceremonies all the cooking fires are blazing brightly, the smell of roasted meat hanging heavy in the air. The forest around seems muted under the glare of the flames, as though for this one night it’s the Na’vi who have precedence over all the other inhabitants. Even the plants’ natural luminescence seems dimmer than usual, Jensen notes before all his attention comes back to Mo’at and Eytukan, standing at one end of the clearing, the huge trunk of Home Tree at their backs.

Mo’at raises both arms in a clear gesture demanding silence, and immediately the clamour of voices dies down, leaving behind only the whisper of the wind and the crackling of flame. At a nudge from Jared, Jensen steps forward along with the other two hunters who accompanied him to _Iknimaya_ to ride the banshees. He forces himself to stand very still, not quite at parade rest because it would look out of place, as Mo’at paces slowly in front of them, intoning some sort of complex chant that he can’t quite make out. He can pick out a few words here and there, but he gets the impression that this is an older version of the language, maybe some sort of ceremonial variant —Grace would know better than he does, he thinks— that isn’t used by anyone other than the _tsahik_. He resists the impulse to fidget or flinch away when she dips her hand first in a bowl of yellow pigment, then in a bowl of red pigment, and sets about adding to the design that Jared already painted on his face and chest.

Finally she stands back, satisfied with her work, and nods once. At her signal, Eytukan steps forward, the necklace of Thanator claws clacking loudly in the stillness.

" _Ngenga 'itan omatikayaä luyu set. Na'viyä luyu hapxì!_ " he declares.

And with that, it appears the official part of the ceremony is over. Jensen finds himself suddenly swarmed by Na’vi youths, patted on the back and congratulated, the air ringing with laughter and shouts until a strong hand grabs him by the arm and hauls him out of the crowd. He almost loses his footing, ends up practically falling into Jared’s arms and, looking up, he finds Jared grinning down at him.

"Congratulations, Jensen."

He grins back. "So I guess now we celebrate?"

Jared nods. "Now we celebrate."

Jensen doesn’t remember ever spending a night this intense, not even in his wildest days serving with the army. What starts out as an evening of eating and singing and telling improbable stories of hunting prowess quickly turns to dancing and singing even louder amidst shrieks of laughter and delight from the younger members of the tribe who are still awake for the festivities. Somewhere after Jensen’s fourth bowl of food Tsu’tey approaches him, wooden bowl in hand, holds it out to him. Jensen looks at him, trying to figure out if it’s an olive branch or a challenge, decides it doesn’t much matter, accepts the bowl and takes a long swallow of the strong-smelling liquid in it. It hits the back of his throat, burns its way into his stomach, and he barely manages not to choke and cough. Tsu’tey grins, takes the bowl back and takes a drink of his own.

"You not used to drink, I think?" he says, dropping to sit cross-legged next to Jensen, jabs an elbow none too gently into his ribs.

"Oh, no, we’ve got plenty of booze where I come from," Jensen assures him.

Tsu'tey throws his head back with a bark of laughter. "Then drink with me, now that you are _taronyu_. Then when you have had enough, you will dance. It is the way," he says, more seriously.

"You should not drink too much," Jared warns him in an undertone. "It is very strong."

"I'll watch myself," Jensen assures him, even though he thinks it might well be a lie.

The stuff is damned potent, vaguely reminiscent of kava, and Jensen finds himself having to match Tsu'tey drink for drink. He feels light-headed, a little giddy by the time he's had his fourth drink, but he's also feeling decently brave now that the alcohol is in his stomach and Jared is still at his back. Also, to his considerable relief, Tsu'tey appears to be just as far gone as he is.

"I thought —enough drink— you would not be so ugly," he slurs, slinging an arm over Jensen's shoulders. "But your eyes are still too small. How do you see with such small eyes?"

"Badly," Jensen manages with a giggle, and is rewarded with a matching fit of giggles from Tsu'tey. It's weird, seeing the normally-intense warrior this loose and unguarded in his responses, and that just makes Jensen giggle harder. When he bothers to think about it at all, he decides that the alcohol is probably a lot stronger than anything he's used to. Or something.

"That is what I say," Tsu'tey agrees. "But you are not so bad. I see how you rid the _ikran_. You fly well, Jensen. He flies well, yes?" he looks over at Jared, who is the only one who hasn't been drinking from the bowl. Jared rolls his eyes but gives them a good-natured smile and nods. "I tell Ìla'rey, the Sky People are cowards. Hide inside the big―" he gestures vaguely, the alcohol interfering with his already-limited English vocabulary.

"Choppers?" Jensen suggests, but Tsu'tey shakes his head. "Machines?"

"Yes, machines," Tsu'tey agrees. "Cowards. Fight from far away. But you —you make good, clean kill. I did not think Sky People can do this."

"I guess we're all full of surprises," Jensen rejoins dryly, and Tsu'tey keeps laughing. Jensen looks over his head at Jared. "Your friend can't hold his liquor!"

Jared springs to his feet, pulling Jensen along with him and toppling Tsu'tey into an undignified heap on the ground. Tsu'tey makes a half-hearted protest, but a moment later another young warrior has taken Jensen's place and is refilling the bowl with pungent-smelling alcohol.

"He will be fine," Jared doesn't quite answer Jensen's implied question. "Now come dance."

"It's the way, right?"

"It is the way," Jared agrees, and pulls him into the circle of dancing people.

* * *

Jensen was never much one for dancing when he was back on Earth. There were a couple of times that he went into bars or clubs, danced with a few likely-looking prospects, but the dancing part was usually short-lived as soon as he found someone to hook up with. He certainly never got into the habit of dancing for the sake of dancing. It was always a means to an end. This, though, this is entirely different. The drums have been beating almost incessantly from the moment the feast got under way, the drummers relaying each other at the their instruments so that everyone might have a turn at the food and the dancing as well as the drumming, and the relentless beat seems to come up through the ground and into the soles of Jensen's bare feet, filling him slowly from the bottom up.

Jared is grinning widely, body already beginning to sway to the beat. All around them the young men and women of the tribe are lost in the sound, in the thrumming rhythm all around them, bodies swaying and gyrating in a complex pattern that seems to come naturally to them. Jared's eyes close as he dances, and Jensen finds himself watching him, transfixed, still a little unbalanced by the unaccustomed excitement and all the alcohol he's just consumed. Jared is beautiful like this, all grace and power and joyful abandon, his muscles rippling effortlessly as he moves to the rhythm of the music.

"You are not dancing!" Jared's eyes open, and he gives Jensen a mock-glare. "Come!"

Jensen stumbles forward, suddenly self-conscious and feeling like he's got two left feet and an extra arm. He tries to mimic the other dancers, almost trips over himself, wants nothing more than to find a way to extricate himself from this bizarre almost-nightmare and just watch from the safety of the sidelines, but there's no resisting Jared when he wants something. Then suddenly Jared is behind him, large hands coming to rest on Jensen's hips, still moving effortlessly in time with the music.

"You are thinking too much," Jared says into his ear, breath hot against his neck, and it sends a shiver down Jensen's spine. "This is not time to think. You have learned how to hear. Listen and hear and do not think."

Jared's hands are searing prints into his skin. It feels like his whole body is thrumming with electricity, alive and more than a little aroused. Jensen is just glad that no one around seems to be paying any attention to that. Jared pushes him, presses up close behind him, still dancing, though his movements are a little more subdued. Like this it's easy to match his every move, to let the undulation of his hips guide him, to feel the rhythm coming up through the ground and dictate to his body what needs to be done. Jared doesn't speak after that, but Jensen can feel that, whatever it is he's doing, Jared approves and even seems like he's enjoying it. It's a weird, unaccustomed sensation, but he welcomes it, lets it flood through him along with the rest of the music.

The dance grows wilder around them, accompanied by whoops and yells of delight. The drumbeat grows more frantic, and soon there's nothing left in Jensen's mind but the relentless pounding of the drums, the white-hot sensation of Jared's fingers travelling along his skin, moving him and letting himself be moved at the same time under the canopy of trees. The fires begin to die down, the embers casting flickering shadows among the trees, the smell of burning woods and long-cooked meat permeating the air under the pungent, wet, sweet smell of the rainforest itself. Jensen keeps dancing, eyes closing of their own accord, letting his body perform movements that now feel as though he's been doing this forever, safe in Jared's arms and surrounded by the protective barrier of the trees.

It's almost a shock to realize that the music has stopped. He comes to a standstill, heart thundering in his chest, blood roaring in his ears, to find Jared's arms still wrapped around him from behind.

"Where did everybody go?" Jensen asks a bit stupidly, as Jared leads him away from the clearing. Or, rather, herds him away from the clearing, ushering him forward by the expedient of putting both hands on Jensen's shoulders and pushing gently. Jensen's whole being is still thrumming with adrenaline, music and alcohol. He feels a little disconnected from his body, like he's floating a couple of inches off the ground, as though nothing around him is really real. He wonders if enough alcohol would sever the link and send him back to his body. He hopes not.

"They are still there. You just do not see them."

"That makes no sense," Jensen twists to try to look behind him, but his view is blocked by Jared's shoulder. It's kind of unfair that he's so tall, he thinks petulantly. Then again, the tall thing has its perks, and Jared is a huge, solid, reassuring presence behind him. The only constant he's had these past few months.

"That is because you still don't see."

Jensen manages to avoid tripping over a protruding root, held in place by the hands on his shoulders. "I thought I passed that test?"

"It is not a test," Jared huffs a laugh. "You are _taronyu_ now, but even _taronayu_ continue to learn even after they are accepted by the _eytkan_. You think learning stops just because you ride _ikran_ once?"

"Um."

Jared jerks them both to a halt. "Stop, Jensen, and see."

Jensen does as he's told, stands very still and makes a point of looking around instead of staring at his feet in order not to trip and fall flat on his face. He figures at this point he's beyond the immediate risk of a pratfall anyway. He raises his eyes, can't quite stifle the gasp that rises in his throat.

"Oh my God."

He doesn't know for how long they were walking, doesn't quite remember how they got here, but he's certain he's never seen this place before. They're standing in a grove of what Jensen can only think of as weeping willows. The trees, like all the others on Pandora, are impossibly tall, and though the great boughs are bent and their leaves trails toward the ground, he can barely make out where the lowest of them are joined to the huge trunks. Unlike all the other trees of the forest, though, these are pure white, as though all the colour had been leeched from them. Jensen remembers distantly that the colour white is simply the refraction of every single colour there is to be found, thinks it might be fitting that these trees are so pure that they send all the colour back out into the world.

"This is _Vitraya Ramunong_ —the Well of Souls," Jared moves them forward, toward the largest tree of all, standing tall and gnarled and majestic at the centre of the grove. "This is the Great Tree, oldest of them all. The voices of _fizayu_ —the ancestors—are loudest here, though when you learn to listen you can hear them always. This is the last part of your time as a child. Now you listen to the voices of fizayu, and you become a man."

Jensen's heart feels like it's crawled up into his mouth. It feels wrong, somehow, to be doing this. To be here, like this, when he's been lying from the start. He is standing next to the living, beating heart of the Omaticaya, and it feels dirty, to come to this place with mixed intentions.

"I don't know if I can..." he whispers, his voice strangled.

"The bond is the same," Jared mistakes his hesitation. "The tree will speak to you just as the _ikran_ and the _pa'li_ , if only you know how to listen. This time, though, it is the will of Eywa that will make itself heard. When you are on the _pa'li_ or the _ikran_ , it is your will that is important. Tonight, you learn to listen to the voice of Eywa."

Jensen swallows hard, feels his entire body grow cold, but he's come too far to turn back now. He reaches out tentatively, brushes his fingers against the surprisingly soft bark of the tree, sinks slowly to his knees on the ground. He startles a little when one of the branches brushes against his shoulder, can see the tiny ciliae waving like tendrils from where they protrude from both wood and leaf. It's obvious, now, what is expected of him, and so he reaches back and pulls his braid over his shoulder, brings it up just close enough to barely graze the tree branch. Immediately the tendrils at the tip wrap themselves around the proffered wood, and what feels like a bolt of lightning races through him. Everything disappears: Jared, the clearing, the trees, everything is replaced with whirling light and the joyous sound of voices raised in a song he will never be able to describe in words. The singing goes on forever, along with an undercurrent of gentle whispers. The light grows stronger and more gentle all at once, bathing him in a softness he's never known in his whole life, filling him with the kind of understanding he never suspected could even exist, and if he weren't already on the ground he's sure it would bring him to his knees.

He sees the rainforest from above and below. He sees it through the eyes of tiny mice that burrow among the roots of the bushes, and through the eyes of the banshees that soar high above the treetops. He sees the Na'vi move along their accustomed paths, and prowls through the underbrush with the Thanator. He tastes the blood of the sturmbeest as the Thanator consumes it, feels its wildly-beating heart come to a stop, feels the fear recede into peace as it rejoins the earth. He climbs into the trees, digs into the soil, scrambles among the rocks, soars along the air currents, and feels as though his heart might burst from the sheer joy of all this life thrumming all around him. There's a bright flash of colour behind his eyelids, and then nothing.

* * *

"Jensen!"

He opens his eyes to find himself lying flat on his back on the ground, staring up into the translucent branches of the trees, Jared looming over him, his face screwed up with worry, running his hands over Jensen's body as though searching for injuries. Jensen's still not sure where the earth ends and his own body begins, but he manages to locate his arm, reaches up to lay his hand on Jared's chest.

"I'm okay."

"You fell." Jared still looks worried. "Are you sick again?"

He shakes his head. "No, I'm fine. It was just...it was a lot."

Jared nods, sits back on his heels and blows out a relieved-sounding breath. "I forget you are not used to _tsaheylu_." He extends a hand, and when Jensen takes it he pulls him to his feet. "You are all right?"

"Yeah," Jensen breathes. "My God, Jared, it was...I can't even say. Is that what it's like for you all the time?"

Jared laughs. "Only here. We cannot speak with the ancestors all the day. They speak a great deal," he says, and Jensen laughs too.

"Fair enough."

"What did Eywa tell you?" Jared seems honestly curious, and Jensen wonders if maybe this is different for everyone who comes here. It's a trippy thought.

"Uh, I'm not sure. I mean, I saw the forest. I mean, really saw it. It's beautiful," he says a little lamely, but Jared is nodding as though he knows exactly what he's talking about.

"You are _taronyu_ , now. One of the People, with a place in the tribe..." he says, and he seems oddly hesitant, a stark contrast with his usual cheerful, easygoing confidence. "The hunter may join the hunting parties, may make a bow of his own from one of the heart trees. If you wish..." he stops again, but Jensen doesn't know what to say and so stays silent, forcing him to continue. "If you wish, you may pay suit to one you want to have as mate."

Jensen swallows. "Uh, what would that mean, exactly?"

Jared's gaze cuts away and he takes a step back. "There are many young women of the tribe who find you pleasing to look at. They are interested by you, because you are not of the tribe, because you are different and new."

Jensen feels his face screw up into an expression of distaste. "What if I don't want to, uh, have one of them as a mate?"

"You don't have to," Jared assures him hastily, and Jensen is pretty sure that the expression on his face is one of carefully-disguised relief. "No one is forced to be with a mate if they choose not to. The People do not believe in this."

"What about you? Grace said you would have to, you know, find a nice Na'vi girl and make lots of babies. Well, at least one baby."

Jared's face flushes, and he still won't meet Jensen's eyes. "It is different for me. I have a responsibility."

"Because you're going to be the next tsahik?"

"Yes."

Jensen moves closer to him, so that their bodies are almost touching. Being this close to Jared is more intoxicating than anything he's consumed that day, his whole body vibrating with anticipation, with want. "Is that what you want?"

Jared swallows, but doesn't move away. "I have spent many years doing what I want. That time is coming to an end."

Jensen can feel the heat from Jared's skin seeping into his own. They're standing so close that it's impossible not to notice that Jared is just as aroused as he is by now, even though they aren't quite touching.

"What about right now?"

"I should not."

"Why not? Who will it hurt?"

Jared makes a sound that sounds like it's caught between a sob and a laugh. "My mother would disapprove."

"Because I'm a man, or because I'm a Dreamwalker?"

"Both. She does not believe you are truly Na'vi. She believes I can't truly love you."

The word sends tiny sparks down Jensen's spine. "And what do you believe?" he asks, can barely make his throat work. "You keep telling me I need to learn to see, to hear. So what do your eyes tell you? What does your heart tell you?" he cringes as the words come out of his mouth, half-afraid Jared will laugh at him, but he lays his hand over Jared's heart as he speaks, and is sure he's not imagining it when he feels it speed up under his palm.

Jared doesn't bother answering, just bends his head a little, and his lips brush against Jensen's, so tentatively at first that Jensen can barely feel it. Then he gains a little in assurance, confidence bolstered when Jensen doesn't pull away, and the kiss becomes more insistent, his tongue pushing at Jensen's lips, demanding access, and Jensen sees no reason at all to refuse. It's different here, standing under the Mother Tree, nothing like that first kiss at the waterfall which was filled with sunlight and laughter. This time Jensen is still halfway overcome by the dance and the final bond with the Mother Tree, and it feels as though Jared is trying to pull Jensen right inside himself, heated skin pressed to heated skin, both hands clasping either side of Jensen's face as though to keep him rooted to the spot.

The kiss seems to last a lifetime and no time at all, until Jensen is forced to pull back and suck in a shuddering breath. His whole body is vibrating with sensations that are at once alien and yet all-too-familiar, with aching need and desire, and all he wants is for Jared to grab him again and keep kissing him until he forgets his own name. Jared is still pressed up against him, and Jensen can feel the hard length of his erection rubbing against his thigh, feels his own dick throb under the skimpy ceremonial clothing he donned what seems like centuries ago.

"God, Jared," he murmurs, unable to feel self-conscious even though Jared is staring at him with those huge golden, cat-slit eyes as though he's the most precious thing in the universe, or as though he might simply vanish into thin air if he so much as looks away for a moment. "So beautiful..."

Jared runs the tips of his fingers over Jensen's face, expression wondering and reverent at the same time. "She says you are not real, and yet I see you. How can you not be real?"

"I am real," Jensen insists. "Just try me."

Jared seems to take him at his word, because the next thing he knows Jared's arms are around him again, pulling him into another searing kiss, and the only thing Jensen can think now is more-more-more, the words looping around in his brain like trapped birds. He manages to free one of his hands, trapped between them in Jared's desperate bid to bring them both together, moves it down Jared's side, marvelling at the smooth strength of the muscles in his abdomen. He strokes Jared's thigh, eases his hand between them again and is rewarded with a jerk of Jared's hips and a small, needy-sounding moan as his fingers wrap around Jared's cock. This, at least, doesn't seem to be any different from what he's used to. He shoves a little at Jared, savouring the taste of his tongue while he twists his hand and pulls in short, sharp strokes, relishing the feel of Jared thrusting instinctively against his hand, until suddenly Jared pulls back, breathless, his pupils blown wide and even more alien-looking now.

"Wait," he manages, and before Jensen can so much as protest the sudden removal of the object of his desire he's hooked his legs around both of Jensen's, bearing him to the ground. He's still breathing hard, but there's more to it, Jensen can tell even while all of his body is screaming at him out of frustration and need.

"Jared, what?"

"Not just this," Jared straddles his hips, leaning over to kiss his way up Jensen's stomach. "You don't know."

Jensen wriggles under the attention, even while Jared's tongue is lapping at him. "Uh, God...Jared, this isn't the...oh, _God_. What?"

Jared makes a slightly frustrated noise and says something in Na'vi, much too fast for Jensen to understand. Not that Jensen can blame him —his own brain isn't exactly firing on all cylinders right at this moment, and English is far from being Jared's first language. "I want...you and me, now. Together," he says, reaches behind Jensen's head and gently tugs at his braid.

Oh. _Oh._

Jared is still rubbing against him, and it's all Jensen can do not to buck against him, seeking out more friction than he's currently getting. He clutches at Jared's shoulders, fingers travelling until they find the braid hanging down his back. "Yeah, yeah Jared. Okay, yes, please!"

He has no idea what he's doing, but it doesn't seem to matter for Jared, who simply reaches around, brings the two braids together, and Jensen almost blacks out from the sudden rush of feelings. There's no easing into this, no keeping his eyes closed and waiting for the world to adjust. It's all a blur of want and need and desperate desire. He can see himself, head thrown back, blood suffusing his cheeks, can feel the burst of lust in the pit of Jared's stomach as he looks at him, feels his own desire coming back at him through the bond. He hears someone cry out, realizes he's hearing himself at the same time as Jared is. Jared moves, and the duelling sensation of his own pleasure and Jared's mingling together courses right through him like lightning. He utters another high, keening cry, bucking desperately under Jared's weight, fingers clawing at Jared's shoulders and he can feel his own fingernails scraping against skin, can't tell which shudder of pleasure is his and which is Jared's. It's too much, too fast, and the next thing he knows he's thrown his head back, coloured light sparking behind his eyes as he comes harder than he's ever come his life.

For several long moments after that everything is blessedly dark. He lies very still, can hear his heart thudding dully in his ears, until gradually his body begins to come alive again, humming with pleasure. He becomes aware first of his own body, then slowly realizes he's still not alone. There's a small burst of happiness, something that is entirely foreign to him that he recognizes as being all Jared, a feeling of contentment and pleasure at having been the source of pleasure for him. Jensen forces open his eyes, finds Jared still stretched out over him, their _tswin_ still closely entwined.

"Oh my God," he manages.

"You are different from the Omaticaya. No one has ever been like that before, together," Jared says, and Jensen thinks he understands what he's trying to say.

"Total sensory overload," he agrees.

Jared laughs, and the laughter seeps right through into Jensen's mind and he laughs too, almost without knowing why. He can't even bring himself to feel ashamed of climaxing so quickly, not with Jared loose and happy above him, wanting him with undisguised lust and...Jensen is almost sure he can feel something under the immediate rush of physical desire, tries to reach out with his mind to see what it is, until Jared's hand brushes against his cock, still oversensitive from the incredible rush from before. He jerks, moans quietly at the back of his throat.

"God, what are you doing to me?"

Jared smirks. "You do not do this among the Sky People?"

Jensen deliberately jerks his hips, brings up a hand to reciprocate, even if the sensation is enough to want to make him lose his mind on the spot. "Don't even try. Is...I don't..." he gropes for words, but Jared places his free hand over Jensen's slips.

"Shh. You think too much, Jensen."

Jared is still rock-hard, pressed up against him. Whatever happened to Jensen, it looks like Jared is more in control of this than he is. Then again, Jared's had a lifetime to practice this and get used to experiencing more than one viewpoint at a time, so Jensen thinks he's doing okay, all things considered. His eyes flutter shut again in spite of himself as Jared begins to move again, this time more slowly, with less of the desperation from earlier, even though it's obvious that he's just as aroused as before. Jensen wonders if it's because he experienced some of the same release, if the fact that his own dick is already starting to take renewed interest in the proceedings is because he can feel how aroused Jared still is, which of them is feeling what...

"You are still thinking," Jared says, and reaches down to gently nudge a finger past Jensen's defences.

Jensen bucks against the sudden intrusion, has slightly wild, panicky thoughts about how he hasn't had any time to prepare for this, but Jared kisses him, and a feeling of calm that isn't his own washes through him.

"It's all right," Jared tells him, "I won't hurt you." Or maybe he thinks it, Jensen can't tell anymore, but he finds himself relaxing into Jared's touch anyway, forcing his muscles to loosen so that Jared's fingers can breach him.

It's not as though Jensen has never done anything like this before, but it's always been furtive, hurried affairs in sordid back rooms or nameless, faceless motel rooms. There wasn't room for much more, not in the kind of life he led, and that was fine by him, or at least he'd thought it was, up until now. Now, though, he's not so sure, because he doesn't remember any of it feeling anywhere close to this good. Even if Jared hadn't bonded them, he thinks a little breathlessly, letting his body move in time with the pace Jared is setting, back arching in a futile attempt to get just a little more contact, just a little closer, he's pretty sure he's never felt quite so close to anyone. Never felt like this, like he mattered at all.

There's a sudden, small pulse of sadness that lodges near his sternum, and Jared trails kisses along his jaw, down his neck, though his hand never ceases its movements. Jensen grips Jared's arms, tries not to tighten his hold so hard that he'll hurt him, confused by the odd emotion that's threatening to destroy what little concentration he has left.

"Jared...what...?"

Jared is busy lavishing attention on the spot where his neck joins his shoulder, but he understands the question well enough. Maybe he can just hear it in his mind, Jensen doesn't know.

"No one has cared for you, when you were joined," he murmurs, just loud enough that Jensen can hear it from the outside as well as through his thoughts. There's another small pulse of sadness, and for a moment he thinks Jared must feel sorry for him. It's not that, though, he realizes. There's no pretense, here, no holding back anything at all. The sadness he's feeling is just that, nothing more, nothing less, and he wonders if all that Jared is feeling from him is confusion and fear.

Jared pulls up, looks him in the eye. "No," he says, clearly and succinctly, and Jensen wants to laugh and sob at the same time.

There's another throb of emotion, one Jensen doesn't quite recognize at first until he feels it echoing back right at Jared from a place inside him he didn't even know existed up until now, and all he can think is that it's not enough, none of it is enough, and he yanks hard on Jared's shoulders, trying to pull him closer.

"Jared, Jared please. Please, now."

The rest of his pleas are swallowed by a kiss, but Jared is more than entirely in agreement with Jensen's request, withdrawing his hand and shifting his hips until he's lined up with Jensen. He doesn't stop to ask if Jensen is sure, if he's ready, because he knows, can feel it just the same way Jensen can feel everything that's happening to Jared's body. Jensen breaks the kiss, biting down on his lower lip with his teeth as Jared thrusts into him slowly, smoothly, not pausing but not going so fast as to hurt or overpower. It's still not enough, and Jensen wraps his legs around Jared's waist, urging him to move, to act on what he knows Jared is feeling but is trying to restrain.

"Come on," he moans, trying to banish the twinge of fear at the back of his mind, the voice that keeps trying to intrude on everything else to tell him that, when this is over, it's all going to go the way it always does.

He knows it's not true, can tell by the way Jared is holding him like he's his most cherished possession, by the look in his eyes, by the love he can feel pouring out of him now and pouring right back in. It's as though they're in a hall of mirrors, endless refractions of the same emotions coming back at him, growing smaller in the distance and yet amplified into infinity, until Jensen simply lets himself drown in the sensation. Until it's nothing but him and Jared, and then nothing but the bond, nothing except the moment in which they both come together and he doesn't know if he's himself or Jared or both, riding on a wave of pleasure and love until the wave crests and breaks and he can't even tell which of them is crying out anymore.

This time he comes down gently from his climax, held in Jared's arms, shivering with pleasure and more than a little with shock. Jared rolls them both until they're on their sides facing each other, a soft smile on his face. Jensen reaches out to clasp his broad shoulders with both hands, clinging to Jared like he's drowning and Jared is the only one keeping him afloat, and finds himself staring into gold-rimmed eyes flecked with hazel. He doesn't know what he expects to find there, doesn't know if he's expecting anything at all, not when he already knows everything that lies in Jared's heart. Slowly Jared brings up a hand, gently takes their braids, and Jensen shudders violently as the bond severs, doesn't break his hold on Jared.

He opens his mouth, only to be silenced by a hastily-placed finger. Jared smiles. "Don't talk. The time for talking is later."

Jensen blinks, nods, and relaxes a little when Jared settles more comfortably in his arms. The mossy ground is soft under them, the night warm even though they're both mostly unclothed. There doesn't seem to be much incentive for them to get up, to return to Home Tree just yet, and so Jensen rests his head on his arm, curls himself around Jared, letting the warmth from their bodies mingle together, and listens to Jared's breathing until they both fall asleep.

* * *

Jensen wakes up in the lab, under the impersonal beige dome of his link bed, and it seems like a pretty cruel joke that the universe is playing on him right about now. He takes a deep breath, shoves at the lid of the bed, flinches when his back spasms under the movement. He's spent nearly twenty-four hours straight in here, thanks to everything that's happened in the outside world over the past few days, and now it looks like his body is going to make him pay for it dearly. Luckily the lid is hydraulically powered, so getting that off isn't too hard, but how he's going to so much as sit up, let alone get into his chair, is another matter entirely.

"Took you long enough," Grace sounds amused. He turns his head to find her lounging in a chair a few feet away. "I was afraid you might let yourself starve to death in there. Your vital signs did all sorts of interesting things, too. I take it you had a good time?"

He allows himself a grin. "It wasn't bad."

She snorts, rolls her eyes. "I'll bet. You want to give me more details than that, maybe?"

His grin widens at that, and suddenly he doesn't even care anymore how much his back hurts or how uncomfortable it is to be lying here, neck craned at an awkward angle so he can watch Grace while he talks. "God, I don't even know how to tell you. It was...I don't know. Incredible doesn't feel like a big enough word."

That gets a smile from her. "So what happened?"

"I...Jared took me to the _Vitraya Ramunong_ after the ceremony."

Grace's usual sardonic poise disappears and she leans over, her expression more eager than he's ever seen it. "He showed you the Mother Tree? My God, I would kill to be able to get in there. Outsiders aren't allowed."

"I think it was part of the rite, but it was after the feast. I just...I can't describe it. It was like I was connected to everything. I could see everything, feel everything."

"You know, taking alien hallucinogens isn't recommended, no matter what ceremonial purpose they serve."

He shakes his head, ignores the twinge of pain it sparks in his back. "No, it was the bond. _Tsaheylu_ ," he says, the word awkward on his human tongue.

"With a tree?"

"Sceptic," he mocks gently. "It was real. Jared said it was hearing the voices of the ancestors, but it was more than that. It was like, I don't know, like I could know everything, if I just figured out how not to get all my synapses fried in the process. It was like when I'm riding, or..." he stops before he can get to what he did with Jared. It's private, none of Grace's business. "It was everything, all at once."

Grace bites her lip. "You know what you're saying, right? This could be huge, could be the answer we've been looking for. I've had a theory about this place for a while now, that there's a neural link between everything, that it's mostly dormant, but that the Na'vi know how to access it. You're practically living proof of that," she says, eyes lighting up with excitement. "We're going to have to run tests..."

"Now I wish I hadn't told you," he protests weakly, not relishing the idea of being poked and prodded, either in this body or in his avatar.

Grace chuckles. "Sorry, Marine. Just tell yourself it's for science. Okay, food and sleep for you now," she pats his arm, starts walking toward the door. "You're not going back out there until I'm sure you're fit. Let's go."

Jensen squirms, resigns himself to having to spill the rest of his secrets with a sigh. "Uh, could you..." he gestures a little helplessly, and Grace turns back. "My back kind of seized up," he confesses.

To his relief she just nods, braces him far more expertly than he would have given her credit for, but rather than helping him to sit up she simply turns him onto his stomach. He lets out a small grunt of surprise when he feels her fingers play along his back, then press against one of the tight knots of muscle.

"This the place?"

"Uh, one of them, yeah."

"This is going to hurt," Grace warns him, and he barely has time to blink before her thumbs are digging into his back, right into the knot she was only barely touching before. He yelps, lets the sound die down to a muffled groan of pain. "Told you it was going to hurt."

"A little more warning would have been n —oh, God," Jensen groans again as the muscle loosens under her touch. "Jesus, where did you learn to do that?"

"You're better off not knowing," Grace says, keeping up a steady circular motion with her thumbs, moving up along his back and working out the kinks as she goes. She smells strongly of cigarette with just a hint of the pungent standard-issue antibacterial soap that's readily available in all the shower dispensers.

After a few moments, during which Jensen seriously considers a new career as a puddle —decent benefits and nothing to do all day except wait to evaporate in the sunlight— she breaks the silence again. "You're taking shit care of yourself, Marine."

He snorts. "I'm fine."

"Like hell. You're skin and bone. I haven't seen you perform so much as a single bicep curl ever since we left for the mountains. Your muscles have atrophied, and not just in your legs. Don't tell me you haven't looked in a mirror since then, I know you have."

He shifts uncomfortably on the link bed. "There hasn't been time. And I couldn't exactly work out while I was sick. That didn't really help."

Grace hums, but it doesn't sound like she's agreeing with him. Before he realizes what she's doing she's pulled down the waistband of his sweatpants.

"Hey!"

"Don't be a baby, it's not like I haven't seen your unclothed ass before, Jensen. You're getting a sore on your hip," she says, and he thinks she might be prodding at it, even though he can't feel what she's doing. "Stay put, I'm going to go find some antibiotic cream and some gauze. The last thing we need is for you to get another infection. I have no idea if another seizure in the link could kill you, but I am definitely not in the mood to find out, especially not before I've had time to run some tests on you."

There's no arguing with Grace about certain things, so he just lets his head drop onto his forearms, lies still while she cleans and dresses the sore —or whatever she imagines might be the beginnings of one. Jensen's never been much of a stickler for that sort of thing, but he does remember from the hospital how unpleasant pressure sores can get, how serious the repercussions can be even without the added strain of being linked up for hours with an avatar. Grace pulls his pants back up, and gives him a light slap on the small of the back.

"All right, you're all set. You need help getting back into the chair?"

He shakes his head. "I got it," he assures her, then sets about trying to prove it as best he can by leveraging himself slowly onto the vinyl seat of the wheelchair, feeling the muscles in his back begin to cramp and seize again even after that small exertion. It's disheartening, in a way, to have his body unable to perform even the simplest of tasks without it feeling like someone's taking a vegetable peeler to his spinal column.

"I know you're probably going to have reconstructive surgery when you go back to Earth," Grace says, almost out of the blue. "If you're going that route, it's all the more reason to keep up with your physiotherapy. You're going to need all the muscle tone you can get once you get the feeling back in your legs."

Jensen leans heavily on the arms of the chair. "And if I don't get the surgery?"

"Then you'll need the extra muscle tone to keep the worst of the pain at bay. And you don't need to pretend that you're not in pain most of the time. I'm a doctor, I notice these things."

"Right."

"I doesn't take anything away from you, you know. Chronic pain isn't a weakness, it's just a symptom, and one that can be managed. Whatever else you might think, you don't deserve to suffer."

It would be churlish in the extreme to tell her exactly what he thinks of her advice. "I really, really wish you'd stop trying to psychoanalyse me. I'm not your lab rat and I'm not your kid," he snaps, whips his chair around 180 degrees and pushes himself out the door to the lab before he can see the expression that he's put on her face.

* * *

The days blur together after that. Jensen spends almost all of his waking hours in the link, flying with Jared and Tsu'tey and the other hunters. They teach him to hunt while on the banshee, and unlike the abysmal horse riding lessons, he proves to be something of a natural at flying, which amazes no one more than Jensen himself. The first time he manages to bring himself into a crouching position is more than a little terrifying, but he takes careful aim with his bow, balancing easily on the banshee's back, lets loose with an arrow and brings down a young sturmbeest, watching it tumble when its legs suddenly give out mid-gallop. There's a whoop from Jared, and when he looks up he even thinks he catches a look of grudging admiration from Tsu'tey himself.

Within a week Jensen is out-flying almost all the hunters except for Jared and Tsu'tey, who are widely acknowledged as the best riders in the tribe, better even than many of the banshee riders from the south. What brings him the most acclaim, though, is his willingness to try new things, to throw himself headlong into the air and just be one with his mount. When he first starts talking about flight manoeuvres with Jared, he's met with a laugh and a puzzled stare.

"I don't understand. What do you mean, to form the meikran?"

"No, not form. Formation. Like when you're going into battle, right? We do it with planes and choppers. To make sure your attack is as successful as possible. You don't want people flying every which way, getting in each other's way, right? Some of the hunters do that, they fly right in front of you and block your shot."

Jared nods. "Yes, the young and the inexperienced. And some others."

"Exactly!" Jensen warms to his subject. "And not only does it mess with your hunt, but it's dangerous. I mean, what if they fly in front of you just as you take your shot? You could hit the hunter, or the _ikran_ , and they could be injured or killed. So you teach the hunters to fly in formation."

Jensen gathers up a bunch of fruit, lays them down on the ground to demonstrate. "You already sort of do it, like it's instinct. The _meikran_ are like birds, they fly in flocks, and flocks are a formation. Those purple birds with the weird beaks fly in a 'V' formation, like this," he moves the fruit around. "It's because that way they all ride the air current created by the birds in front of them, and the strongest bird leads the flock."

"I see," Jared leans forward, rearranges the fruit again. "If we are to fly like this, then there are to be two groups that can be separate to hunt, and bring the herds about."

"Uh, yeah, I think. You mean one group of hunters drives the sturmbeest toward the others, right?"

"Yes."

"Okay, yeah, that would totally work," Jensen nods enthusiastically. "You're totally a natural at this, our air force guys would love you."

Jared pulls him up by an elbow. "I want to go now."

"What, like, try out the manoeuvre now?"

"Yes."

"But there's only the two of us."

Jared looks at him like he's grown an extra head. "I don't understand why that matters."

"You can't fly a formation with just two people. It defeats the purpose."

"We try it. It is a test."

"A dry run," Jensen rubs the back of his neck. "Okay, sure. Come on then, let's go."

It's not like Jensen needs much of an excuse to saddle up—metaphorically speaking, since the _meikran_ don't take kindly to their riders using anything except the bond when they're aloft. He enjoys the feeling of the wind rushing by far too much to ever refuse the offer of going flying. His _ikran_ , which he named Beidai when Jared made it clear that he couldn't not name her —or worse, name her Skippy— is a fearsome creature, almost too wild to be ridden. She won't let any of the other hunters so much as come near her. She's older than most of the other _meikran_ who allow themselves to be ridden, Jared told him on their first day.

"Actually, that's pretty appropriate, since I'm a lot older than most people are when they become hunters," Jensen had said with a shrug. He kind of likes the fact that the two of them form an unconventional pair, a bit like him and Jared, in fact.

He and Jared have slowed things down a little bit, of common accord. Jensen's still adjusting to having his mind literally blown, and he thinks Jared might have found the —feedback, for lack of a better word, a little overwhelming to deal with as well. The whole experience of feeling someone else's emotions at the same time is still a little too intense for either of them to be entirely comfortable with it. Jensen thinks it might also have something to do with the fact that his own thought processes are a little too alien for Jared to cope with, too. The Na'vi, while not exactly free of negative emotions, aren't nearly as self-conscious and neurotic as most humans. Or maybe that's just Jared; it's not like Jensen has any basis for comparison.

Jared bumps shoulders with him, derailing his train of thought before it can get too dark. "Come on, it is going to be dark soon!"

It's a matter of moments to call the _meikran_ to them, and soon they're aloft with a few beats of the banshees' powerful wings, soaring above the treetops. Jared immediately takes the lead, flying away from the treetops and toward the plains to the west of the mountains, where he proceeds to try and put his plan into action on an unsuspecting herd of _yerik_. The animals bleat in fear and gallop away as fast as they can under the sudden onslaught, with Jared whooping and laughing as he tries to drive them toward Jensen. If he had another two or three riders with him, Jensen thinks, they might make some headway. As it is, the herd splits apart, and try as he might Jared can't quite get them to all go in the direction he wants. It doesn't prevent him from trying, though, and soon Jensen finds himself laughing and joining in the chase, swooping after the panicked herd until they thunder far enough away to be clear of their tormentors.

Jensen takes Beidai in a slow, lazy circle, scanning the air for Jared, trying not to worry when he realizes he's lost sight of him. He risks a glance over the banshee's neck, trying to see if Jared might not be below him, and that's when he catches sight of a huge shadow overtaking his own, right above. He twists in his seat, looks up in time to see the most enormous creature he's ever laid eyes on bearing down on him, talons outstretched, its wingspan blotting out the light of the sun.

The wind whips away the scream that tears itself from his throat, and he has just enough presence of mind to make Beidai bank sharply to the left, and the great bird's claws miss them by inches. There's a shriek of fury from below them, a great boom as leathery wings beat against the sky. He can hear Jared calling to him from far away, can only hope that he's far beyond the reach of this new threat, whatever it is, and urges Beidai forward as fast as she can manage. Luckily the banshee needs very little encouragement. He can feel the terrified hammering of her heart, adrenaline coursing through both of them, and she puts on a burst of speed the likes of which he never suspected her capable of, aiming for the nearest line of trees. He can hear the great bird rising back into the air behind him, preparing to give chase, knows that it's just a matter of time before it catches up. Speed is the only thing that will save them—even if he had his bow he suspects it would be next to useless against such a monster. Once among the trees, though, he'll have a chance at survival.

Beidai hurtles through the air, no longer chasing after wind currents, her frantic wing beats propelling them toward the forest. They reach the trees in the nick of time, the great bird pulling up short behind them and rising up above the treetops with another frustrated scream. Beidai keeps flying, weaving in and out of the tree trunks with reckless abandon, heedless of her own safety or her rider's, her mind almost blanked out with panic, until Jensen recovers himself enough to realize that it's partly his own terror that's making her act this way. He forces himself to send a calming impulse through the bond, orders her to slow down. Eventually she finds a perch in a large tree where they both come to a grinding halt and all but collapse, safe for the moment.

Jared finds them several minutes later, nestled in the branches of the tree, breathing hard. but otherwise unharmed. "Jensen!" he calls out, bringing Zeizei to a halt nearby and all but leaping from her back. "You are hurt?"

Jensen shakes his head. "No, no I'm fine. Just about pissed myself, but we're okay, both of us. What the hell was that thing?"

"It is _Toruk_."

* * *

It's only when they're back in the relative safety of Home Tree that Jared continues to explain about the _Toruk_. He takes Jensen through the great carved halls until they reach a room filled with what look like animal totems. At the far end, Jensen sees a bird-like skeleton that spans almost the entire wall, the skull a familiar-looking shape.

"This is _Toruk_ ," Jared says, and points to the wall, which is covered in what looks like the elaborate illustration of a story. There image of the bird-thing is unmistakable, even stylized like this. " _Toruk_ is master of the sky."

"Last shadow?" Jensen tests his translation of the name, and Jared nods. "Makes sense. It's the last shadow you ever see before you die," he shudders. "So what's going on in here? Is it a hunt? Is that a guy on the _Toruk_ 's back?"

"That is _Toruk Macto_ , the greatest of all the riders. It is the Na'vi way, to become rider with ikran. But when there is great trouble, then it is said that _Toruk Macto_ always appears and unites all the tribes, to fight against the darkness.

"Rider of the last shadow?"

Jared nods. "My ancestor —father of my mother's father's father— was _Toruk Macto_."

Jensen feels his eyes widen, impressed in spite of himself, and Jared continues, encouraged by his silence.

"The stories speak of it. He tamed the great shadow and appeared before the tribes one by one, and they knelt before him and agreed to set aside their differences." He reaches out to grasp Jensen’s wrist, thumb pressing against the pulse-point in the way the Na’vi have when they’re imparting something vital. "The sorrows ended, they say, for a thousand years. They also say that when a thousand years pass and the _Toruk_ comes again, it will be to change everything we know and all of history will begin anew."

Jensen can't think of anything to say to that that doesn't sound lame, but he does make a point of asking about the creature when he gets back to the lab that night.

"It's the Great Leonopteryx," Grace tells him, pulling up images from the video feed. "It's probably from the same family as the banshees, it has the same general physiology."

Jensen stares at the images, fascinated in spite of himself. Before all he had been aware of were the massive jaws and the great beating wings, but now that he has a chance to see the _Toruk_ from a distance, as it were, he can begin to appreciate just how beautiful the creature really is. Grace is right —it looks a lot like a banshee, only about a million times larger. It's enormous, striped scarlet, yellow, and black along its back and wings, with a midnight blue crested head.

"It's beautiful," he repeats aloud, and Grace stares at him, obviously surprised.

"Don't tell me you have a poet's soul hiding in there, Marine."

"Bite me. What the hell is a leonopt...whatever."

"Don't strain yourself," she rejoins dryly. "What you're seeing here is the apex of the food chain."

"Baddest cat in the sky," Trudy's voice comes from behind them. She's leaning in the doorway, arms folded over her chest, one leg crossed over the other.

"You were lucky," Grace nods. "Not only is it really rare, but the sightings tend not to get reported."

Trudy saunters forward and makes a show of making an exaggerating clicking motion with her thumb. "What she means is there usually isn't time to key the mike before..." she draws her thumb across her throat.

"The people call it _Toruk_."

"Last shadow," Norm breaks in helpfully.

"I know that, thanks. I figure they call it that because it's the last one you'll ever see," Jensen finds himself staring at the image, not wanting to look and see the expression on Trudy's face.

"I saw one take out a gunship, once. BAM! Total freaking yard sale. It ate the crew like they were a pack of salted peanuts."

The aerial footage is still rolling, the Leonopteryx long since vanished, and Jensen spots a familiar-looking grove. "Hey, that's it! That's where Jared took me. The _Vitraya Ramunong._ "

Norm boggles. "You never told me you got to see the Well of Souls!"

"You didn't ask. I told Grace. What, you expect me to report to you too?" Jensen snaps, then subsides at a look from Grace.

"I just... it's their most sacred place. I never... they must really trust you," Norm breathes, eyes bright, his expression caught between admiration and envy. Jensen squirms.

"Right."

"I'd die to get in there and get some samples, but outsiders are strictly forbidden. I don't suppose you could ask Ìla'rey if they could make an exception?" Grace looks hopefully at Jensen.

"No idea. I can ask, but sometimes they get weird about that sort of thing."

"I can't ask for more than that. Maybe they'll let you take samples, if you ask nicely enough. I can show you how so you don't wreck them." Abruptly Grace punches the 'pause' button. "Okay, show and tell is over, kids. Norm, let's go, those works aren't going to translate themselves. Jensen, take a damn shower, and for God's sake eat something. You stand sideways and stick out your tongue people are going to mistake you for a zipper."

Jensen snorts. "Stand sideways. That's real funny."

"You know what I meant. Get something to eat or I'll have a feeding tube put in whether you want it or not."

He rolls his eyes, but there's no point in arguing with her about this. She and Norm disappear around the corner, leaving him staring at the paused image of the _Vitraya Ramunong_. Trudy hasn't moved from her position behind him.

"You know, this is exactly the kind of information the Colonel wants," she says quietly.

Jensen's already downloading the images and the coordinates on a chip. He doesn't know what he's going to do with it yet, but duty dictates he give it over to his commanding officer. It's what he's always done, although this is the first time he's ever really considered disobeying a direct order.

"If you don't give him something, he's going to shut all of this down," Trudy says. "Norm would probably pitch a fit if he knew I was telling you this, and Grace would pitch me out an airlock, but I know what your orders are. You, _amigo_ , are between the proverbial rock and a hard place, and I don't envy you in the slightest."

Jensen stares at the memory chip in his palm. It looks tiny and fragile, nothing big enough to threaten everything that the Na'vi hold dear. All he has to do is hand it over to Quaritch and his work will be done. He'll be rotated back to earth, get the surgery, see his family again. He doesn't know if all the money he's earned in the past few years is enough to get them away from the contaminated ranch they were living on, but he thinks it might well be. They received all his danger pay as well as his regular pay, since he had literally nowhere to spend it, so the only thing left is to earn the money for his surgery. Quaritch has already promised is going to happen anyway, so there's no reason to stay here, not anymore. Except that Jensen has every reason to stay here.

"Grace and Norm, they're not going to tell you this," Trudy drops to a crouch in front of his wheelchair. "I get that you like the guy. I don't know him, but I've seen him a couple of times, I saw him when he came to see you when you got sick. I like you. I think he's probably okay too. But you can't be with him."

Jensen's head jerks up at that. "What? How do you―"

"I'm not stupid, and Norm has a big mouth," she grins, then sobers immediately. "Look, Grace, she's a romantic, even if she acts all tough. Norm likes the idea too, even if he's an ass sometimes. Me? I'm a realist. You can get all freaky with your alien guy out there, but he lives here and you don't. You being with him costs millions of dollars and takes all this," she gestures at the lab, "to keep up. You take a good look at yourself in the mirror tonight, _amigo_ , and then you come back and tell me if you don't think this trying to live in two worlds isn't killing you."

With that she pushes herself to her feet and walks out the door to the lab, leaving him to stare at the data chip still cradled in his palms.


	5. The Warrior's Choice

**Part IV —The Warrior's Choice**

Somehow, somewhere along the way Jensen deluded himself that making the decision to give Quaritch what he wanted would make everything easier. No looking back, no regrets. It's been that way all his life, ever since he was a kid and figured out that it was Tommy that everyone expected to succeed, Tommy who was so bright and so full of promise. Everyone liked Tommy, wanted him to do well, Jensen included. No sacrifice was too big, so long as it meant Tommy got to do his studies, got all his degrees, had that brilliant career he was always supposed to have. Jensen got used to being in the background. Hell, he liked the background, liked being where no one took any particular notice of whether he failed or succeeded, because there was no pressure there. All his life decisions were made for him by other people, and he's learned never to second-guess the few decisions he did get to make, no matter the outcome. So this? This should be no different. It was a tough choice, but it's been nothing but thirty years of tough choices, and you learn to live with it. Quaritch would get what he wanted, Jensen's parents wouldn't waste away on a patch of land that was slowly killing them, Jensen would go home, learn to walk again, and everything that happened here would fade like a particularly vivid dream.

Not surprisingly, nothing of the sort happened. All that's happened since he gave up the data chip is that he's been progressively twisting himself into increasingly complicated knots. Jared was the first to notice, badgered him to spill what's on his mind, but it's not like he can confide in the one person whose confidence he betrayed above all the rest. _Shit_. The more he thinks about it the sicker Jensen feels. He hasn't been back to Home Tree in nearly two days, lying to Grace about not feeling well, like a kid playing hooky from school, because he can't bear to look Jared in the eye anymore. Instead he's been skulking around the base, trying to avoid everyone and everything. Of course, the problem with that strategy is that he's been alone with his thoughts ever since, and not finding the experience a pleasant one. He wishes they could just pack up and go back in the mountains.

"You’re not gettin’ lost in the woods, are you son?"

Lost as he is in his thoughts, he never hears Quaritch come into the armour bay where he's been sitting, arms folded on a break table, watching the harsh artificial light bounce off the laminated surface like it might just hold all the answers he's been looking for. Quaritch pulls up a chair, turns it around and straddles it, facing Jensen. Jensen can feel his eyes on him, studying him, taking in the weight loss, the week's worth of beard growth, the dark circles he knows are now like permanent bruises under his eyes.

"Your last official report was two weeks ago," Quaritch says, and there's a world of meaning in those words. Jensen's been on-base for two days, now. Plenty of time for him to make up his reports. Instead he gave up the data chip with barely more than a couple of annotations.

Jensen can’t meet his eyes. "Sorry, sir. Had a lot on my mind. Worried about my parents, mostly. It's been months, sir, and nothing. Not even a message. I checked with Shirley in admin, and," he hesitates, then decides it's worth risking getting on the Colonel's bad side for this. "She never really gave me a straight answer. I don't suppose you know anything, sir? I know comm sec comes under your responsibility."

Quaritch's look is shrewd. "We've had to limit the transfer of messages through the relays lately. I haven't checked any of the messages personally, mind you. If you're waiting on something, it might be in the queue until we can release it. Operational needs first, Marine, you understand about that."

"Yes, sir." Jensen understands all too well. If his parents did send him a message —and it's nigh unthinkable that they wouldn't, not after all this time— then Quaritch is holding it hostage in exchange for his good behaviour. The Colonel isn't stupid, Jensen knows that, and he's probably figured out by now that Jensen doesn't care as much about getting his legs back as he might have done before he got here. So Quaritch is using a different emotional leverage now to keep him on the straight and narrow.

"I gotta say, you're spending so much time in the lab and out there that it's starting to look like you're avoiding being here, in the flesh, as it were." It feels like the Colonel's eyes are boring straight into his skull. "If I didn't know better, I’d be starting to doubt your resolve by now, son. From what I see, it’s high time we terminated this mission, before you lose yourself out there."

"What? No, sir. I'm not done, not by a long shot," Jensen protests, but the Colonel doesn't look to be in an open frame of mind.

"Out of the question. Look, Corporal, you’ve given me plenty of usable intel," Quaritch holds up the data chip between his middle and index fingers. "This 'Well of Souls' place you showed me, well, it means we've got them by the short and curlies with that with that, when it turns into a shit-fight. Which it will. No two ways about it." Quaritch tucks the chip away and slaps his palm lightly on the table. "So you’ll get your legs back, like I promised. I am a man of my word, after all. It's time to come in from the cold, son."

"I don't think it has to come to that, sir. I think we should try to talk to them, have an official parlay. Their leaders and you and Selfridge, see if we can't work it out that way. They'll respect that, they believe in the leaders of a tribe speaking the mind of all."

"We're not a tribe, and the sooner you remember that, the better. I'm pulling you out before you forget what colour your skin really is."

Jensen shakes his head. "I’ve gotta finish this thing, sir. I know you get that. I need to prove I can do this."

The Colonel's gaze doesn't waver, and although Jensen can see a look of understanding there, he's pretty sure Quaritch doesn't understand a damned thing. "All right, son, I get it. You need to prove to yourself what you've gotta prove, that's fine, but this is bigger than you, Corporal. I needed you to talk to those savages and make 'em see reason, and so far I haven't seen squat. So unless you can turn things around right here, right now, we're moving in, and I mean ASAP. I've got everyone ready, we can move out with a turnaround of less than thirty-six hours if we need to."

A chill runs down Jensen's spine. "They've already let me be part of the rite of initiation, and they're waiting for me to finish proving myself. It's just a matter of time...I’m practically one of them." He swallows hard. "They’ll trust what I say..."

"All the more reason for you to be the one to tell them they have to relocate."

"No, Colonel, you can't―"

"Don't you presume to tell me what I can and can't do, Corporal!"

Jensen fights the urge to throw up. It's all been for nothing, the months of learning, of training. Of falling in love. It all came down to one wrong choice, and now all the Omaticaya, maybe all the Na'vi, are going to pay for his mistake, unless he can fix this. He back-pedals as fast as he can, trying not to stammer.

"That's not what I meant, sir. No disrespect. I just, I think maybe we might be jumping the gun, trying to strong-arm them. They'll be open to talks, I know they will. You won't need to expend the resources on this. Let me talk to them, let me bring them to the negotiating table again and we'll make it work!"

"You think you can do what no one's been able to do for fifteen years, then?" Quaritch is openly sneering at him.

Jensen nods fervently. "I've managed the rest of it, haven't I?"

"All right, then. Get it done, Corporal. And get it done fast!"

* * *

Jensen runs. It feels a lot like the first day he arrived on the planet, a giddy feeling of racing headlong into the unknown, except that this time his heart is pounding with fear, adrenaline coursing through his body. He has no idea how long he has until this all goes to hell. All he knows is that this is it, his choice is made, that no matter what he does now it's going to be too little and very likely too late.

Jared meets him halfway up the great stairway, hurrying to greet him, his expression worried. "What is it? Jensen, what is wrong?"

He doesn't even know where to start, has to clamp down on a slightly hysterical laugh. "I'm so sorry. I'm sorry, I should have told you before, but I didn't—I couldn't, and I'm so sorry."

Jared narrows his eyes. "I don't understand. What are you talking about?"

He can barely breathe, like there's a vise clamped firmly around his chest, but he forces himself to be calm. "I have to speak to Eytukan, and to the _tsahik_. About what...what my people want to do. What they're trying to accomplish. Please, we don't have much time left!"

"All right," Jared steps behind him, ushers him forward. "We will go."

Jensen races to the top of Home Tree, Jared scrambling to keep up for once, doesn't so much as wait for Jared to announce him before bursting in on what looks like an informal meeting of some of the elders of the tribe. Eytukan is there, as is Mo'at, and suddenly Jensen's mouth goes dry, his tongue trying to crawl its way back into his throat.

"I..."

Mo'at rises from where she was seated. "Jensen. You interrupt."

"I'm sorry, it's important," he stammers. "Please, I wouldn't have come unless it was important."

"Speak," Mo'at nods, as her husband comes to stand beside her, the necklace of Thanator claws clattering on his chest. For a moment Jensen can only stand there, thinks a little stupidly that he's never seen Eytukan without the necklace, that he's never seen him move without hearing the accompanying rattle.

"I..." he trips over his own tongue again. "My people want you to move. To leave Home Tree. They, uh, they want to mine under its roots."

There's silence, not that Jensen was expecting them to leap up and start packing, but the sudden stillness is unnerving.

"What else?"

Jensen blinks. "I don't...what do you mean?"

Mo'at folds her arms carefully. "We already know this. There have been offers. They ask us to leave before, but Home Tree cannot be left."

"No, I mean..." Jensen swallows hard. "I mean they're going to try to force you to leave. They want the mineral that grows under the forest, and they don't want to wait anymore."

"So they send you to tell us this?"

He shakes his head. "No. No, I came to warn you. I don't want this, you have to believe me. I don't...I didn't think this would happen. I didn't mean for any of this to happen, not like this. He's going to try to destroy the _Vitraya Ramunong_. The bulldozers can't be stopped, not by you. They're too big, even if you go up against them with all the warriors of the tribe."

An alarmed murmur goes up at the mention of the Well of Souls. "Jensen!" Mo'at snaps, interrupting him. "You say he knows the location of the _Vitraya Ramunong?_ How is this possible?"

"Yes," he says desperately. "There's video footage. Um," he gropes for words to translate what he's trying to say into a language they'll understand. "The Sky People took cameras up with them in their ships, they took pictures, from high up. They can see where it is."

"You told them. You are the one who told them where it is."

It's Jared's voice, flat and accusing, from behind him. Jensen flinches, can feel his shoulders slump, but he can't bring himself to deny the truth. This is all his fault. "I didn't mean for this to happen," he repeats miserably.

"This is why you stay away. You lie and don't want to see the ones you lie to." Jared is staring at him, his eyes reflecting Jensen's betrayal like an accusing mirror.

"I want to fix this, Jared, please, you have to believe me, I don't want any of this."

Jared just steps away, his face screwed up with pain, though he's doing a pretty good job of keeping himself under control. "I should have known," he says, a sneer turning his voice hard. "You mean nothing of it. All the Sky People have done is lie, for years. They told me it would be so with you, but I thought you were different."

"I―" Jensen chokes. "I tried to be. I want to be, Jared. Please, we can still try to fix this. You have to talk to Selfridge, maybe there's a way out of this, some other way."

"No." Eytukan steps forward this time. He only has a limited grasp of English, but he uses the words that he has at his command now to make sure that he's well understood. "You leave, Jensen Ackles. Not of the People."

"Please," Jensen's not above begging, not if it'll mean that he can salvage some of what he's built in all this time. "Please, let me just try. Mo'at, please, I'm telling you, if we don't try something they're going to destroy all of it and I can't...I can't bear it if they do and it's my fault. Please let me try to make this right. Let me try to talk to them. They'll listen to you if you come and negotiate, I promise, we have to at least try. You can't do anything if Quaritch comes at you with his ships, they'll just burn the forest, raze everything to the ground if it means they'll get what they want."

"You want us to speak to the Sky People? And what do you think they will say if we tell them we do not move?" Mo'at wants to know.

He makes a helpless gesture. "I don't know. I don't know, this isn't anything I'm good at. I never learned how to do the whole politics thing. I'm a shitty liar and an even shittier negotiator and I didn't think, but we have to try. There's got to be another way around this. Maybe they can find a different way to get what they want from the forest."

Jared is glaring at him, and there's pure anger in his voice when he speaks, emotion making his grammar more stilted than usual. "You know this all along, but you come now and say you want this to change? Why should I believe you when all you say before is lies?"

"I'm not lying now! And it wasn't all lies," he turns to Jared, pleading silently with him for understanding that he probably doesn't deserve anyway. "Most of it wasn't. I just... I didn't know what I... I was just lost, okay? You're the only one who sees me," he adds softly, and he can see the moment in which Jared hesitates, the moment when his words sink home.

But Jared shakes his head. "Lies," he repeats.

Mo'at holds up both her hands. "Peace, Ila'rey. We will go speak to the Sky people, if that is what is needed. We are both peoples who have history and feeling. Let there be talks, if that is what is needed. Jensen, you will take us to the speaking place?"

Jensen nods frantically. "Yeah. Yes, I can do that. I need to talk to them first, let them know you're coming. We can meet in neutral territory. I mean, not Home Tree or the human base, but somewhere in between."

"A speaking place," Mo'at says again.

"Yeah, a speaking place. Give me a few minutes, I'll set it up, I still have a radio, I can call in and let them know we're coming. They'll talk to you, you're a respected elder here, and I can make them listen." He's grasping at straws, desperate and a little panicky, but there's nothing left for him now but desperation. He's probably signed his own metaphorical death warrant with this, but there's no way around it, now.

"Go do so. We will wait for you to return. Ila'rey will go with you, and Tsu'tey, to make sure you honour your word. The Sky People have lied too much now, your word is not good here."

"Thank you," Jensen says fervently. "Thank you, you won't regret this, I promise!"

"Do not make promises you cannot keep," Mo'at tells him, then points, her meaning more than obvious.

"I'll call it in, let them know," Jensen motions to his radio. "But I have to go back. They want me there. I'll come back as soon as I can. I will stand with you on this, I promise."

For the second time that day Jensen takes to his heels, this time back toward the human base. Only this time, he can't help but feel that he's running in the wrong direction.

* * *

The negotiations are a disaster.

"You've got to be kidding me," Selfridge is obviously out of place out here, even though the clearing has been set up to keep him and the other humans as comfortable as possible in light of the fact that they're in the middle of the rainforest. "Can someone please explain to me what the hell I'm doing out here in this mud-infested hell hole instead of watching the progress of our bulldozers on the screen from the safety of my nice, dry, air-conditioned office?" He squirms and tugs at the collar of his shirt, directs a glare at no one in particular.

Jensen can't help but think that the humans —swaddled in khaki uniforms that only make them stand out more among the brilliant colours of the forest, look puny and a little ridiculous next to the Na'vi who are twice their height their faces partially obscured by the rebreather masks— All the avatar drivers are there in their avatar forms, so at least Jensen doesn't feel like he's completely alone. Somehow it feels like it's evening things up a little, as though it's the humans who are at a disadvantage here instead of being those in the position of power.

Mo'at towers over Selfridge, her arms folded across her chest in a pose that fairly screams intransigence. "The Sky People do not understand the ways of the forest. Home Tree cannot be 'evacuated,' as you say. Jensen, you will translate?"

Jensen nods. "Uh, Norm can help, too. His Na'vi is much better than mine. Norm?"

"Of course," Norm places his hands together, fingertips barely touching, and bows slightly in her direction. "I am happy to be of assistance," he says in slightly stilted Na'vi, but it's better than anything Jensen can manage on short notice, and Mo'at appears mollified. Grace is there too, but Jensen knows first-hand that she's been forbidden to so much as open her mouth by Selfridge and Quaritch, under pain of being gagged and tossed in a holding cell. She's furious, though, that much is obvious, her anger directed at Jensen as much as any of the others who are responsible for this latest turn of events. Jensen can't meet her gaze, figures that if looks could kill he'd have been dead hours ago, doesn't know if she'll ever be able to forgive him. Hell, he's never going to forgive himself; it's a bit much to start asking others to do something he's unwilling to do.

Mo'at gathers herself. "You say your desire is for the rock that dwells under the roots," she says, in her language. "The Omaticaya can help you with this, but it must be done with care. The forest cannot be treated as you treat it. Where you go there is only death, and the life does not return. The Omaticaya will help you if you agree to stop your mining operation immediately."

Selfridge snorts derisively when the translation comes through. "Don't be stupid. We don't need your help when we have all the equipment we need. We just want a minimum of fuss, here, and the way that's going to happen is if you and your little friends find yourselves a different tree to perch in. I mean, is that so hard? There are millions of trees out there, don't tell me there aren't, I've seen them!"

"Mr. Selfridge," Jensen interrupts, "it's not the same. It's an ancestral home. They've lived there for generations. It's not just a tree, it's a whole—"

"I don't recall asking for your opinion, Ackles!" Selfridge snaps. "You can't spit out here without hitting a sacred tree or a sacred puddle or a sacred mosquito. It's ridiculous and frankly I'm a little tired of having to constantly make concessions, here. Tell your little buddies to move, or we'll make a point of doing the moving for them!"

It doesn't take a mind-reader to see that Mo'at has understood most of that little speech. Her eyes are smouldering with poorly-concealed anger. Jared's face has turned dark, and even Tsu'tey's hand has drifted toward the dagger he keeps at his belt, though Jensen is pretty sure none of them would violate the sanctity of this parley. If Selfridge meant to provoke them he couldn't be doing a better job of it, though.

"Sir, they're offering to bring you the mineral without your having to mine it. Wouldn't that cut down on costs by a huge amount?" he prods.

"Not at the quantities they're offering. How are they going to extract it, anyway, by digging? I don't recall seeing mining equipment hidden among the ferns here."

Jensen turns back and relays the message as best he can, relying on Norm for some of the harder words. "He wants to know how you can get the ore from under the earth without any equipment."

Mo'at's face has become impassive again. "The gift comes from Eywa, and it is all around, in the soil and the mountains, in the rivers. It can be done, but it takes time. The Sky People are too impatient."

"Impatient?" Selfridge explodes. "I'll give her impatient! I have a planet of ten billion people dying back there who are only waiting for us to deliver their salvation. What do you think that means? That means we deliver the damned mineral on schedule, or else this whole operation gets shut down from a distance."

Jensen can't even begin to translate that, and isn't sure he wants to. Sure, the Panderium has proved to be the single most effective means in helping Earth climb out of the hole it dug for itself, but he's pretty sure Selfridge is overselling it, here. Jensen doesn't know anything about corporate policy, but it sounds like the little bureaucrat has lost all perspective on the matter. Jensen wouldn't be surprised if Quaritch had a hand in helping to entrench Selfridge's views of the Na'vi, for that matter.

He steps back and lets Norm take over the translation, grateful at least that Norm is trying to tone down just how insulting Selfridge's words were. He tries to catch Jared's eye, but Jared is resolutely looking away, and Jensen can see a muscle working in his clenched jaw. He bites his lip, heart sinking in his chest, wonders how he ever thought that this was going to fix anything. Quaritch is standing off to the side, watching the whole proceedings with a steely look in his grey eyes. He looks like he's just waiting for someone to make a wrong move, Jensen thinks, just waiting for an opening, any excuse at all to lay waste to the whole place with a well-timed blast from his flagship's cannons.

The talks go back and forth for what feels like forever, but realistically can't be much more than an hour, since that's the size of the exopacks that they brought with them. Jensen thinks they should have brought bigger ones, but since it's obvious the humans don't actually want to negotiate at all, there wasn't much point. It's all just for show, he thinks miserably, a way to prove to the people back home that they tried to negotiate in good faith with the local indigenous population and it just didn't work out. A way to show that there was no other solution to the 'Na'vi problem' than a big show of force.

"Screw this noise," Selfridge says abruptly, and gets to his feet. "We're done here. There's no reasoning with these people, they're goddamned savages."

"Sir..." Jensen tries again, but there's no use. To his surprise, Grace breaks in.

"Parker, don't be a moron. They're offering you what you want on a platter! Are you seriously going to throw that away?"

Selfridge whips around where he is, eyes blazing. "What did I tell you about talking? Someone get her the hell out of here. Who even thought it was a good idea to let the bitch come in the first place, would someone answer me that?"

Jensen never sees what happens next. One moment Grace is shouting at Selfridge, Selfridge is shouting back, then there's a sudden movement among the Na'vi, and the next thing he knows Corporal Wainfleet —always the more trigger-happy of Quaritch's bunch— has opened fire, directly at Mo'at. Under Jensen's horrified gaze, Eytukan throws himself in front of his wife, his chest blossoming crimson, and crumples to the ground.

* * *

"Cease fire! Cease fire!"

It's pandemonium. For a few seconds the air is filled with the sounds of screaming and a few rapid bursts of gunfire, quickly silenced as the officers get the men back under control and order them back to the transports. Jensen can't make heads or tails of any of it, can't figure what just happened out of the corner of his eye. He finds himself lunging at Selfridge, hauling the tiny man up by both arms. It's ridiculously easy to do, Selfridge is so small, his feet kicking as he wriggles in Jensen's hands.

"Put me down, Corporal! What are you thinking?"

"You stupid son of a bitch!" Jensen snarls. "Do you have any idea what you've done?" There's no reasoning with him now, though. Jensen half-expects the Na'vi to retaliate, now that the peace has been broken, but they seem just as shocked as he is. They're crowding around Eytukan's prone form, their voices raised and anxious. Jensen all but shoves Selfridge at Quaritch. "Take him!" he snaps. "You've declared war, so you'd better be prepared for it now!"

He doesn't stop to see whether or not his message has been received, turns on his heel and sprints toward the small crowd of Na'vi, shoves his way through. The chief is on the ground, bleeding from a wound in his abdomen, but he's still alive, and that's something. "Ìla'rey!" he uses Jared's Na'vi name to make sure he gets his attention. "We have to get you guys out of here. Let me help!"

Jared turns, but it's Tsu'tey who steps in front of him with a snarl, his knife drawn. "Go back, human! Or I will open you up so that your innards spill and replenish the earth."

He skids to a halt. "Tsu'tey, brother―"

"You are no brother of mine! You are not of the People! Have you not done enough?" Tsu'tey's face crumples with anger and pain.

"I'm sorry," Jensen pleads. "I can't take it back, I can't make it better, but let me help at least with this!"

Jared is already gently pulling his father to his feet. Eytukan lets out a groan of pain, and at a gesture from Jared, Jensen pulls the chief's other arm over his shoulder. This may all be his fault, but he can at least shoulder part of the burden of getting him back. The others in the small party fall in behind them, wary of the predators in the forest that will doubtless be attracted by the smell of fresh blood.

The trek back through the forest feels like forever, but they're close enough to Home Tree that Jensen knows it can only have taken a few minutes. Already one of the younger hunters has been sent ahead to run and warn the healer of their arrival, and when he and Jensen carry the now almost-unconscious Eytukan in, she is already there, waiting.

"Stand back," she tells them sternly, but even before she kneels to examine the wounds, Jensen can tell it's a lost cause. Even a team of surgeons probably wouldn't be able to repair all three bullet wounds, and Jensen knows enough about being shot in the abdomen to know that infection is likely to set in. Worst of all, though, is the chief's _tswin_ , which has been all but severed from his head by a stray shot. The sight makes Jensen want to vomit.

Jared is kneeling by his father's side, well out of the way of the healer, clasping one of Eytukan's hands in both his larger ones, whispering a desperate prayer, and Jensen can see tears spilling down his cheeks.

Then Eytukan coughs weakly, blood leaking from the corners of his mouth, tugs Jared closer in order to speak to him. " _Ma'itan_ ," he manages, and Jared only shakes his head.

" _Kehe.._."

" _Ma'itan, tskoti munge,_ " his free hand gropes for the great bow that he always carries, now laid at his side. With a great effort he manages to lift it, tries to press it into Jared's hands. " _Omatikaeru tìhawnu sivi._ "

" _Ma Sempul.._." Jared is sobbing openly, as are most of the others in the room, and Jensen finds himself scrubbing at his own eyes as the man who welcomed him into the tribe as one of them slips away, one drop of blood at a time.

The healer rocks back on her heels, shakes her head. "He returns to Eywa."

Jensen risks stepping forward, puts a hand on Jared's shaking shoulder. "I'm so sorry..."

He half-expects Jared to turn around and hit him, but it's never been the Na'vi way to express sorrow with violence. Instead Jared just keens harder until Jensen pulls him into his arms, hugging him as tightly as he can, even knowing that it's too little, too late.

"Take my son outside," Mo'at says, her voice breaking over her own tears. "There will be time for grieving later, but our people are in peril. Ìla'rey, you must, lead our people through these dark times. Give your father's bow to Tsu'tey, it is his to take up now."

" _Sa'nu.._."

"Now!" she orders, and there's no arguing with her tone.

Jensen tugs gently on Jared's arm, his other arm still around his shoulders. "Come on. They're not going to stop now. I can help, but I don't know how much time I have left, Jared." He gets an uncomprehending look at that, realizes that, in spite of everything, Jared still doesn't understand how impermanent this avatar body is. "Jared, they're not going to let me stay with you. The minute I wake up back in the lab, they're not going to let me link up again. They're going to lock me up for treason, for siding with you. So you need to be ready for when they come because I won't be around to warn you. Okay?"

Jared nods, follows him outside, wiping the tears from his face. "I must tell our people that we are at war. We have not had a war in five generations," he says dazedly. "Where is Tsu'tey?"

"I am here, Ìla'rey," Tsu'tey steps forward. "What do you want done with the traitor?"

Jared shakes his head. "He will be gone soon. There is nothing to be done. Assemble all the warriors, we need to prepare. Jensen..." he falters, still in shock, and it's all Jensen can do not to pull him close again, to try to kiss away the tears he can see welling in his eyes.

"I'll tell you everything I know," he promises. "All of it, as much of it as I can manage. I promise. This is my fault, but I want to at least try to help, as much as I can, anyway."

"We need to know what we are fighting against, what their weaknesses are. We don't have such machines as you do. What hope do we have against them?"

Jensen winces. "Not much, but they're not invincible. You'll need to get everyone out of Home Tree, though, at least temporarily. They'll come straight for it, try to use fire or bombs to knock it down, use the deaths of the weak and defenceless against you. I know Quaritch, he'll want to do this as fast as possible, so he'll strike for Home Tree first, and when you're reeling from that shock he'll threaten the _Vitraya Ramunong_ so you'll surrender."

Jared is shaking his head in denial, as though he simply can't wrap his mind around such a way of thinking. "Why would they do this? Why, when we offer what they wanted? What purpose is there in such killing as this? There is no reason to it."

"I..." Jensen shrugs helplessly. All the reasons he can think of are nigh unexplainable, each of them worse than the last.

"Why are you here?" Jared rounds on him so quickly that he reels.

"I don't —I had to come. I made a mistake," he stammers. "I made a mistake and I can't fix it, but this is where I belong. With you. If you'll let me, I mean. I want to stay, as long as I can."

Jared lets out one last, quiet sob before pulling himself together. "Come," he says, and motions to Jensen to follow him. "Tell me everything you know."

He's obviously not forgiven, but at least it's a start.

* * *

Jensen gets even less time than he feared with the Na'vi. He's mid-sentence when the world suddenly tilts and swirls into darkness. He comes to with a sickening lurch as the shell cover of his link bed is wrenched open. For a moment nothing makes sense, the whole room spinning and rocking, and all he can do is lie where he is, trying desperately not to throw up. The next thing he knows his hands have been zip-tied together and he's being bodily hauled out of the unit by Corporal Wainfleet, who simply tosses him over his shoulder and drags him out and into the hallway before he can even think of trying to defend himself. By then, of course, it's too late, and he can only stare helplessly at the floor moving past, gritting his teeth as the movement jostles his already-sensitive spine. His stomach roils, and he considers letting himself puke down Wainfleet's back just out of spite, ends up swallowing hard and just bearing it until he gets dumped unceremoniously on the floor of the operations deck, nearly breaking his nose in the process. He stifles a groan and wriggles a bit, managing to turn over just far enough to find himself staring up into the cold eyes of Colonel Quaritch.

"You disappoint me, son," Quaritch tells him. "You want to tell me what you were thinking, telling those savages all our classified secrets? That's treason, soldier, and you know it."

"They're not savages," Jensen protests before he can stop himself.

"Oh, you're going to play that card, are you?" Quaritch sneers. "Tell you what, boy: if it walks like a savage and talks like a savage, odds are good you've just gone soft. I hear you went and found yourself some native tail —literally. I never figured you for a queer, Ackles, but I guess looks are deceiving."

Jensen bites his tongue. There's nothing he can say now that's going to help him. It's ironic, he thinks with something like grim amusement, that it's only now that he's getting in trouble for getting involved with Jared, now that it looks like Jared wants nothing to do with him anymore.

"So here's what's going to happen, boy. You are going to tell me everything, and I do mean everything, that you told them. And then you are going to be extra-specially forthcoming about everything that the Na'vi have planned. You can't pretend they aren't planning some sort of full-on assault. The whole damned forest has been crawling with activity—so much activity it's been impossible not to notice it, even if they do like to blend in with their fucking trees."

Jensen shakes his head. "No."

Even though he's expecting it, the brutal kick to his kidneys still catches him unprepared. Tied up and twisted around on the floor like he is, with no leverage at all, he can't brace himself for the impact. He lets out a pained cry in spite of his best intentions to stay quiet.

"'No' is not an acceptable answer!" Quaritch bellows. "Look at what your little sympathy for the aliens has cost us."

He points at a monitor, which Wainfleet is obligingly setting up for him. The camera pans across the hulks of what looks like they might have once been bulldozers and the toppled remains of a charred ampsuit. Jensen can't help but wince when he sees the bodies of dead soldiers sprawled on the ground, enormous arrows jutting obscenely from their chests.

"I don't understand," Jensen stammers, breathing hard. When he left the Na'vi they hadn't so much as formed a plan of attack, let alone put one into action. He has no idea how much time has passed, why he didn't awaken the moment the link was severed. None of it makes any sense.

"They hit with banshees first," Wainfleet is saying, not bothering to hide the loathing in his voice. "Set the ampsuit on fire. Driver’s toast."

"The rest of the squad?" Quaritch asks, though it's obvious enough what happened to them. Jensen gets the feeling that this is a movie reel being put on entirely for his benefit.

"Six bodies. That’s all of ‘em. And the equipment is totalled."

"Christ." Another voice joins in —Selfridge. Jensen didn't see him when he was brought in, but he figures that he must have been standing off to the side, willing to let Quaritch do all of the dirty work. It's obvious from his tone that he's more upset about the loss of the equipment than the men.

"You going to talk now, boy?" Quaritch nudges Jensen's hip with the toe of his boot. "How about you start with what you told that alien who's been fucking you up the ass!"

"No!"

"Don't be a martyr, Ackles," Selfridge breaks in. "No one likes those, they're just annoying and all holier-than-thou. Look, up until recently you've been a fine asset to the team. You gave us all the intel we needed to take out their damned tree, and they're still fighting us on this. We already got corporate approval for your surgery months ago. So as far as I'm concerned, our contract still holds, if you're willing to keep your end of the bargain. You tell us what we need to know and we're even: you get up off that floor, we put you back in your quarters, rotate you back out to Earth on the next flight out."

In another life, Jensen in quite sure he would have been tempted. As it is, he wriggles a little ineffectually on the floor, turns his head far enough that he gets a good view of Selfridge's boots, and spits at his feet. Selfridge steps back with a muted cry of disgust.

"Well, I can see living with the savages hasn't improved your manners. Let it not be said that I didn't try."

Quaritch's boot connects with Jensen's kidney a second time, and a third. The kicks come faster after that, and Jensen instinctively brings up his arms to shield his face, isn't surprised when blows start falling thick and fast from all sides, as though others have joined in, determined to exact revenge on him for their fallen comrades. By the time something hard and heavy connects with the back of his skull, he's only too glad to be able to lose consciousness.

* * *

Jensen comes to in semi-darkness, finds Grace and Norm sitting to either side of him, cross-legged on the cold, hard floor of one of the holding cells on the base, their expressions grim. They sit, staring in silence, each at something he can't see. He thinks it might be night-time, but they're obviously wide awake. He's been there before, in the past, when things got bad: too wired to sleep, too wiped out to move, as though the life has been drained right out of you.

He opens his mouth, finds his throat has closed up almost too tightly to speak, swallows gingerly. "I'm sorry."

He's never felt this much pain since the day the anti-personnel mine blew his spine to shreds. Every part of him that he can still feel throbs and burns, and when he tries to turn his head stars spark in his vision.

Grace looks down, as though she's not surprised that he's awake. "They never wanted us to succeed," she says softly. He's never seen her like this before, the expression on her face too much like defeat, as though the level of betrayal she's experienced has surpassed even her wildest fears. "They fed us lies for years. From the start."

He doesn't know what to say to that. Norm just reaches over and squeezes her shoulder, then looks down at him, makes a sardonic-looking peace sign. "How many fingers?"

"At least one too many," Jensen feels like his tongue is trying to fuse with the roof of his mouth. "How long was I out?"

"Can't tell the time in here, but about a day. We've been here longer, and God only knows what Quaritch has managed to do while we're shut up in here. You think you can sit up if I help you?"

He nods gingerly. "Won't know until I try."

He can't help the groan of pain as Norm hauls him upright —it feels like someone has poured molten lead down his spine— but once he's up and has pulled in a few steadying breaths he finds that the pain becomes bearable again. He coughs, tastes copper in his mouth even as more pain lances down his spine, and Norm helpfully holds up a tin mug with water in it so he can drink.

"So, you got a plan, Mr. Marine?" Norm asks a little drily when he's caught his breath again, and Jensen grimaces at the thought.

Before he can formulate an answer, though, there's movement at the desk outside. The lone soldier set to guard them looks up from where he's been twiddling his thumbs as none other than Trudy approaches along the corridor, pushing a stainless steel trolley with what looks like the evening meal for the prisoners.

"Yo," she greets the guard amiably enough. "These fuckwits giving you any trouble?"

"Nah. You know scientists," comes the derisive reply. "All soft. They've been sitting where we told them to sit, just like dogs."

"Except dogs don't talk back as much," Trudy nods in agreement. "Maybe we should get 'em de-barked, what do you think?"

The guard laughs. "Hell, yeah, especially Augustine. She's got a real mouth on her, don't you, bitch? I bet I could make some different noises come out of that mouth. Better ones."

Trudy snorts. "I got orders to bring food, anyway. Apparently we still have to feed them, traitors or not. Personally I think steak’s too good for them, but that's just me.

"They get steak? That’s bullshit. I haven't had anything but the damned slop from the mess hall since I got here. Let me see that..."

He bends over to look into the hot cart, still bitching about traitors getting better treatment than him, then freezes as the muzzle of Trudy’s pistol presses behind his ear.

"Yeah, that's right," she says softly, pushing him first to his knees, then to his stomach. "All the way down, _pendejo_."

She grins at Jensen, Grace and Norm, all of whom are staring at her with identical expressions, mouths hanging open, then puts two fingers in her mouth and whistles. Right on cue, none other than Dr. Max Cullimore trots around the corner and helps himself to the unfortunate guard's key card while Trudy blindfolds him, binds his hands and feet with his own zip ties, then cold-cocks him for good measure. Max fairly bounces to the cell door, swipes the card, then makes an elaborate, sweeping bow.

"Gentlemen, ma'am, this way if you please."

Jensen lets out a pained laugh. What with everything else that's been going on, he let himself forget about Grace's right-hand man in the lab, the guy behind the clipboard. He feels a little bad about it, since apart from Norm, Max was the first person here to actually be nice to him.

"Service with a smile. Max, you are a sight for sore eyes."

Max makes a show of rolling his eyes. "Oh, sure, now that I'm saving your asses you talk to me. I was beginning to feel ignored, there. I got your wheelchair, left it in the hallway while we were busy taking out G.I. Joe, here."

"You're a lifesaver, literally," Norm tells him.

Norm is the first out the door and retrieves Jensen's wheelchair from where Max left it. He's helping Jensen into it when the sound of heavy boots coming down the hallway alerts them to the arrival of another soldier. Trudy takes him out neatly with a well-placed blow to the jugular and a knee to the crotch that has Jensen, Max and Norm all wincing in sympathy. Norm pulls her in for a kiss, which she returns enthusiastically.

"Babe, you are kick-ass."

There's a resounding clang, and Jensen turns in time to see that Max has soundly clocked their guard —who obviously tried to make a move— using the coffee urn that came with their meal. Max puts the urn down, wipes his hands on his lab coat.

"That was unexpectedly satisfying."

Gritting his teeth against the pain in his back and arms, Jensen wheels forward, grabbing the sidearm from the second soldier while Trudy binds his wrists. He meets Trudy's eyes, sees nothing there but resolve. "Thanks."

"Don't mention it."

He checks the ammunition in the sidearm, puts the clip back in place, then turns his chair so that he's facing them all, feels his face pull into a mirthless smile. "So what do you say? Time for a revolution?"

Grace shrugs. "Why not? My schedule just unexpectedly freed up."

* * *

They make pretty decent time, with Norm taking over pushing Jensen's chair when it becomes obvious that the beating he took earlier has made it all but impossible for him to move faster than a slow crawl. Jensen clenches his jaw in frustration, but he's not so stubborn that he's going to choose to put them all in jeopardy because of his damned pride. They sprint down the utility corridor under the base, commandeer as many sets of exopacks as they can take with them before hurrying to the airlock closest to where Trudy's Samson is parked.

"Think you can get your ship fired up before anyone figures out what we're doing?"

Trudy nods. She grabs Norm, pulling him with her through the airlock. Jensen turns to Max.

"I know this is a lot to ask, but I need somebody on the inside I can trust. Someone who can feed us information and tell us when the shit's about to hit the fan. Those two soldiers never got a good look at you. If you make yourself scarce now, they won't suspect you. Think you can do it?"

"Of course," Max nods, and Jensen grips his hand hard, his chest and throat unexpectedly tight.

By the time Grace and Jensen are in sight the Samson, Jensen can see Norm helping Trudy race through the pre-flight checks as the turbines spool up. For a split-second he allows himself the optimistic thought that they might be able to get out of here entirely undetected. Of course, that's when a searchlight hits the Samson, bathing it in bright white light and leaving them all exposed.

"Shut down your vehicle! I repeat, shut down your engines and step out of your vehicle, or I will be forced to open fire!" The soldier, one of the newer recruits whose name Jensen never bothered to learn, is very obviously nervous, his assault rifle unsteady in his hands. "I need you to shut down and step out of the chopper now!"

Jensen rolls up behind him casually, aims his pistol at the base of the guy's spine, ignoring the pain in his back as he does so. Poor kid never stood a chance, he thinks, and wonders if he was ever this clueless when he was a nameless, faceless grunt back on Earth. "Take it nice and easy, trooper. Now," he continues quietly, "on the ground, face down. Hands behind your head. Do it!" he snaps when the soldier hesitates.

Norm leaves Trudy to her prep, jumps down and grabs the trooper’s rifle and side-arm, giving them to Grace so she can cover the guy. Norm lifts Jensen out of his chair, staggering a little under his weight, and carries him to the back bay of the chopper. There's no time for niceties, no time even for Jensen to feel humiliated at having to be hauled around like a useless sack of potatoes. Grace follows them, throws the chair in while Norm is helping him to strap in, then jumps in herself. Over her shoulder Jensen catches sight of a small platoon of soldiers coming toward them at a run, weapons already pointed. He twists a little in his seat, thumps the side of the chopper.

The Samson lifts off in a blast of rotor-wash just as the soldiers open fire and rounds rake the ship. Trudy banks hard, using the bottom to shield them from the worst of it, the movement jolting Jensen painfully. He can hear the sound of bullets whacking into the hull of the ship as she climbs-out over the tree-line, mercifully undamaged. He lets out a whoop of exhilaration and pumps his fist.

"Oh yeah, baby! Everyone all right?" he asks belatedly.

There's a moment of silence, and when he looks over he sees Grace staring at her hand, which is covered in blood. There's a large stain spreading across her abdomen, soaking her white t-shirt. She looks up, the colour draining from her face, eyes wide with shock and more than a little fear.

"Crap," she says quietly. "This is...going to ruin...my whole day."

"Jesus," Jensen can't move from where he is, yells over the comm. "Grace is hit!" He leans forward as far as he can manage, grabs hold of her hand. "Hang on, Grace. We'll get you patched up as soon as we land, okay? We're nearly there. Just hang on for me..."

* * *

"This is a bad plan, Jensen. You betrayed the Omaticaya, what makes you think they're going to help us with this?" Norm is running diagnostics on the nearest available link bed even as he complains, punching at buttons as quickly as he can manage, his face a mask of calm and efficiency even though Jensen knows he must be feeling as panicked and disoriented as the rest of them. Thank God for people calm under pressure, he thinks, shifting painfully on his wheelchair. "And no offence, but you look like utter shit. You looked like shit before, and now you look like shit that's been worked over by a bunch of really aggressive marines."

"Yeah, I'm aware," he rolls his eyes. "But it's the only plan we've got. Trudy, you think you can move these units to a different location? Quaritch knows where they are, he'll aim a missile right at us first chance he gets."

"No problem. I can take them into the forest, hide them away at least for a little while. Can't promise you won't get motion-sick, though."

Norm doesn't let himself get derailed that easily, though. "I'm not kidding, Jensen. What if you have another seizure in there? God only knows how all this is going to translate in the link."

"I have to try," Jensen shrugs. "Give me a second," he says, wheeling himself through the narrow passageway to the infirmary, where Grace is lying on the only bed, looking pale and drawn under the oxygen mask strapped to her face. He can see the plastic fogging up every time she breathes, far too infrequently for his liking. He doesn't want to think about what he'll do if the Omaticaya refuse to help after all. He doesn't think they will —the People aren't needlessly cruel, and Grace has always been their ally, even when they haven't agreed with her— but he's not willing to take the risk, not now after everything. For all he knows Tsu'tey has taken over the tribe already, and he's angry, rightfully so, and there's no telling what he might do if Jared isn't there to rein in his temper.

Jensen comes as close as he can to her bed, smoothes a hand over her head. She looks small like this, diminished. Fragile, even. It never occurred to him before today that she might die. "Grace, I need you to hang on for me, okay? I'm going to get help. Norm's going to take care of you until I get back. You stick with him and Trudy, and we'll get you fixed up, okay?"

She doesn't answer, her breathing loud and agonized even under the mask, but her gaze goes to him and he can tell she's understood. There's no time left to waste. He wheels back to where Norm has finished setting up the link bed. Jensen tries to pull himself up onto the bed, and to his embarrassment finds himself folding in half instead when the pain from his ribs threatens to rip him in half.

"Come on," Norm says, and Jensen kind of wants to hit him for using such a gentle tone, like he's suddenly turned into porcelain that might shatter at any moment. Norm hoists him up by his armpits, ignores his muted groan of pain, and briskly arranges his arms and legs form him, but his expression is twisted with worry and disapproval. "Jensen, I don't know if you're up for this —physically, I mean. Look, the last time you went in without being in good shape it just about killed you, and―"

"No choice, Spellman," Jensen interrupts. "Just get on with it."

"It's your funeral. Okay, you ready?"

He forces a grin. "Born ready," he manages, and lets himself fall.

* * *

Home Tree is burning.

He wakes up under a bush, his body stiff and a little cramped from being casually dumped there, and the first thing his sees is flame and smoke, rising in a column into the sky above the forest canopy. It's just like in his dreams, he realizes, a cold lump forming in his stomach, and he scrambles to his feet, swallowing the bile that keeps trying to rise in his throat at the sight of what he's come to think of as his home going up in flames. There's no going back, not to the human base, and now it seems like there's nowhere to go to, either. He swallows, eyes stinging, feels anger coiling inside him, replacing the cold, dark feeling from before. God damn them all, he thinks, they're not going to get away with this. Not while he still draws breath.

Jensen takes off at a run faster than he's ever managed before, even when he was sprinting to warn the Omaticaya of the impending human invasion, clearing small streams and underbrush in leaps and bounds that on any other day would have made Jared proud.

Jared, God.

He has no idea what he's going to say to any of them, no idea how he's going to ask for help after everything that's been done to them. Home Tree is all but gone, its branches set alight by Quaritch's flamethrowers, its roots torn up, its trunk split and burnt. The Na'vi are no longer there, driven away into the forest in the wake of the destructive fire, but they haven't gone far. The _Vitraya Ramunong_ , for all that it's their spiritual dwelling-place, is also extraordinarily well-protected. It's the one small blessing in all of this, that even Jensen hadn't been able to tell just how sheltered it was by huge rocky formations on three sides, making it accessible only by one path.

He finds the Omaticaya gathered in a large clearing not far from the Mother Tree, the huge boughs of the willow brushing against the ground, a strange echo of the sadness and despair he can see in all of the people.

"Jared!" he yells, spotting him standing a good head above most of the other Na'vi. "Jared!"

A shocked murmur goes through the crowd of remaining Na'vi, but they part when Jared turns and hurries toward him. Jensen braces for his reaction, is at once relieved and disappointed when Jared stops just short of him, his face like stone.

"You are back."

"I came back as soon as I could. We escaped from the base, we're setting up camp in the mobile units, trying to stay under the military radar. I saw what happened to Home Tree...Jared, I'm so sorry, I'm so sorry, I know you can't forgive me, I wouldn't forgive me either..."

"You bring news of the Sky People's attack?" Jared interrupts. His expression has changed, but Jensen still can't read it, wonders if hope is making him read something that isn't there.

"Not exactly. I have information too, but I need your help, Jared. One last time. It's not for me," he says, forestalling the protest he can see forming on Jared's lips. "It's Grace. We escaped, but she got shot. I know I have no right to ask this of you, but...can you help her?"

Jared purses his lips, looks back to where his mother is sitting at the foot of the Mother Tree, in a cross-legged pose of meditation. "I can't help, but perhaps the _tsahik_ can."

* * *

It's still the middle of the night by the time Jensen is able to fetch Grace back from where Trudy has moved the mobile outpost. He wastes no time, scooping her up into his arms as easily as if she was a rag doll, explaining the decision in a few curt sentences. Her head lolls against his arm, but she's still alive, still conscious even. Norm is already protesting their decision, but half-heartedly, as though he knows there's no other option for them, not if they want Grace to live out here where there is little by way of human medicine, and where it's the Na'vi way that holds sway. He's already linked to his avatar, further proof that his arguments are _pro forma_ rather than truly sincere.

"Grace, are you sure this is what you want?" he asks, jogging at their side, trying to keep up with Jensen. They left Trudy behind to monitor their vital signs, although Jensen figures that that's a luxury they won't be able to afford for very long. Soon, they'll have to fend for themselves and just hope for the best. "You won't be able to go back after this. You'll be stuck here forever!"

"It's not nearly as awful as you're making it sound," Jensen pants, beginning to tire in spite of himself. He's been running on no sleep and little food and pure adrenaline in this form since the day before yesterday, and even if this body is far from weak, it still can't run on fumes forever.

"Easy for you to say," Norm snaps at him. "You're not the one making a permanent change here."

Grace laughs breathlessly. "Hen," she accuses Norm. "I'll be fine." She doesn't have the strength to do much more than that, until they arrive at the clearing and are greeted by Mo'at, standing at the end of the path that leads into the Well of Souls.

"I see you, Jensen," she greets him, "and I see you, _Dok-tor_ Grace. You have been told of what lies ahead?"

Grace nods. "Yes."

"You see and you understand what it is we will do? You will become one body, where before you had two. No more will you walk with us only in dreams, but in life as well. You will learn to become one of the People. Your cup has been full for many years. Do you consent, now, to empty it?"

"Yes," Grace says simply, and that seems good enough to Mo'at, who motions to Jensen to follow her.

He moves carefully along the path, through the grove of willows, is surprised when Grace speaks again. "It's so beautiful," she murmurs. "I should take samples..."

He huffs a laugh. "Why don't we wait a little bit for that, okay? Right now we're kind of worrying about making you better first."

Two of the Na'vi who came with them lay Grace's avatar at the foot of the Mother tree, curled up in a foetal position, stripped naked —maybe as a symbol of new life, Jensen isn't sure. At Mo'at's direction he lays Grace down facing it, making sure her mask is still firmly secured, then steps back as Mo'at and Jared begin to work feverishly to prepare both bodies for whatever it is they're about to do. Jensen is sketchy on the details of what this transfer is going to entail, but he's had enough talks with Grace to realize that the Mother Tree can act like a sort of conduit of information, so if anything can preserve Grace's mind and spirit inside another body, he figures it's this.

Jared and Mo'at each dip their fingers into bowls of pigment, tracing elaborate patterns quickly and efficiently over the two prone forms. Jensen watches Jared at work, sees him glance repeatedly at what his mother is doing, maybe to see if she's all right, maybe just to double-check his own work, it's difficult to tell, and Jensen doesn't want to disrupt their concentration. Finally they both step back, and Mo'at approaches him.

"The Great Mother may choose to save all that she is, in this body."

"So it is possible?" He still can't quite believe it, even after all this time.

"Possible, yes. She must pass through the eye of Eywa. But, Jensen, she is very weak. It is possible that the Great Mother will choose to bring her spirit home to rest, to give her life back to the forest. Do you understand?"

"I understand," Jensen says, even though he doesn't quite believe it. Grace is indestructible. What force in its right mind would ever dare try to rob her of life? To his surprise, Jared comes to stand next to him, and the soft smile he directs at him almost makes Jensen burst into tears on the spot. Slowly, tentatively, he lets one hand creep toward Jared, feels his heart swell to what feels like five times its normal size when Jared reaches out to grasp it firmly, squeezes it once before letting go again in order to tend to Grace. This, he thinks, is all the forgiveness he's likely to get, but it's enough.

He stands back as Mo'at begins a long, ululating chant. All around him he can see the Na'vi gathering close, linking arms and hands together, swaying to the rhythm of the chant. Then, slowly, tiny white root-cilia appear from the ground all around Grace and her avatar, off-shoots from the Mother Tree. They undulate and grow, longer and longer until both of the bodies are almost entirely covered, like a shroud, fused to the root floor by a thousand connections. The cilia entwine with the avatar's _tswin_ and begin to pulse and glow in the darkness, radiating white energy as the chant grows louder.

Grace is stirring a little, her eyes open and staring at something that Jensen can't see. She grips reflexively at his hand when he works up the nerve to go kneel by her side. If she's dying, he tells himself, then she shouldn't be allowed to die alone.

"She's real, Jensen," she murmurs. "I can see all of it...she's real..."

Her eyes close then, breath expelling itself in a quiet sigh. Jensen strokes her face. "Grace?" he whispers, but he can tell she's gone from this body.

He looks over to where Grace's avatar is still curled on its side, watched over by Mo'at. The _tsahik_ looks up at him, shakes her head. "I am sorry, Jensen. She is with Eywa now."

Jensen swallows the lump in his throat, nods, even as he feels Jared's hands on his shoulders, strong and comforting. There'll be time for mourning later, but right now there's a war to be fought.

* * *

Jensen spends a sleepless night trying to think through this mess he's gotten them all into, with memories of Grace intruding on everything else, making his thoughts spin in unproductive circles. Then, just when the night was at its darkest, he drifted into an uneasy sleep that was filled with the same dreams as before, the great black shadow drifting along the ruined ground, and that's when he remembers the _Toruk_. The way Jensen sees it, _Toruk_ is the baddest cat in the sky—just like Trudy said. It's death from above, death to anything in its path. Nothing can stand before it. So it follows that _Toruk_ never expects anything to come at it from above.

Jared laughs incredulously when he tells him his plan.

"You are insane!"

"Crazy like a fox," Jensen grins, his heart already speeding up just at the thought of what he has in mind. "Jared, we have to do this, it's the only way. The Omaticaya alone can't hope to defeat all those ships, but with the other tribes on our side, we can do this. I know we can. It has to be you, Jared."

"No," Jared shakes his head. "What you are saying cannot be done. No one has ridden _Toruk_ in a thousand years."

"But it was your ancestor," Jensen insists. "This is in your blood, it's your destiny. I dreamed this, Jared. I didn't know what I was seeing before, but I know it now. I dreamed of flying and fire, and I saw _Toruk_ in my dreams. You can't ignore this."

Jared snorts, but Jensen can see he's won him over already. "Eywa gave a sign about you."

"The _atokirina_ , I remember. So Eywa trusts me, right? What about you? Give me a chance, here. I know I'm right about this. You're the best flier of the Omaticaya, your ancestor was _Toruk Macto_. You can't ignore this," he repeats. "It's destiny, Jared."

"You are insane," Jared repeats, but this time the corners of his mouth lift into a smile.

"That settles it, then. Let's go!"

And then they're both aloft on their banshees, sailing up into the clear blue sky of Pandora.

Jensen leads the way, sensing Jared's hesitation. This way, at least, he knows Jared will follow him, and he's pretty sure that once they're in position, Jared won't hesitate. This is his destiny, it's been in his blood for generations, calling to be let out again. _Toruk_ doesn't always hunt along the same paths —all the creatures learn to avoid the places where it goes, so it has to change up its routine in order not to starve— but it's so enormous that it's impossible to miss even so. Jared's right, Jensen thinks with a giddy laugh —he's got to be insane for thinking this is ever going to work, but then again, he's pretty sure all the last-ditch attempts at saving the day over the years have been insane. They've been remembered, whether they worked or not. The Light Brigade, the Battle of the Schism, the Alamo...

He spurs Beidai to greater and greater heights, can feel the _ikran's_ heart pounding with fear and exertion as he takes them further up than any rider has ever dared to go. Jared is an indistinct blur to his left, but Zeizei is taking him up as well, ever higher, until the air turns thin and the ground becomes nothing but a great patchwork of colours below them.

"There!" Jensen shouts suddenly, pointing at a patch of scarlet several dozen yards below them. Up hear he can barely make himself heard above the whistling of the wind, but Jared sees his gesture, yells back something that sounds like agreement, his words snatched away by the wind.

There's no time for hesitation now, no room for mistakes. Jensen brings Beidai around in a great arc, aims her almost directly at the _Toruk's_ back. His trajectory will take him just past the leonopteryx, but if they've timed this properly, then Jared will land directly astride its back. At this stage, Jensen's presence is a formality. He's here only if Jared should happen to miss his landing, if he falls, but if that happens then they're both dead anyway. They're too far from the tree line to escape if the _Toruk_ gives chase, and give chase it will, Jensen is sure of it.

All these thoughts flit through his mind in a split-second as he hurtles through the air. There's a loud whoop of defiance from Jared, and suddenly the air is filled with a screech that seems to echo off all the mountains of Pandora. Jensen is aware of a great beating of yellow and crimson wings, of Beidai banking sharply to avoid being caught in the backwash from the _Toruk's_ struggles, and he brings her around again, trying to see whether or not Jared is still astride the great beast.

There's another shout, and Jensen finds himself uttering an answering whoop of triumph as the _Toruk's_ wild thrashing ceases almost immediately and it levels out above him, the great wingspan blocking out the light of the sun and casting a flickering shadow on the ground below. Jared is standing on its back, his _tswin_ firmly entwined with its antenna, holding on with the tips of the fingers of one hand, the _Toruk_ inescapably under his dominion. Jensen pumps a fist into the air.

" _Toruk Macto_!"

Jared swoops ahead of him and it's all he can do to keep up on his banshee, until all he can see ahead of him is the enormous silhouette of the _Toruk_ , ridden by its master and framed by the smouldering ruins of the forest leading to what is left of Home Tree. Zeizei has already banked to soar away over the treetops back toward the eyrie, and for a moment Jensen feels a pang of sorrow for her —she and Jared won't be riding together until the battle is won and _Toruk_ is set free to roam the skies again, which might very well be never. There was no choice, though, none at all. Jensen falters a little, feels Beidai hesitate under him, forces himself to focus. This is it, he realizes, it's everything he dreamed about: the dreams of flying, the nightmares of fire and destruction. He's seen all of this before, and he has no way of knowing whether or not it's for good or ill.

Jared, unaware of the turmoil in his mind, is setting a gruelling pace for them, taking them back toward the Omaticaya, and Jensen puts on another burst of speed. There's no way of communicating any of this to Jared now, and anyway, he reasons, it would serve no good purpose. They can deal with this later, if there even is a later.

Shrieks of terror greet their arrival, and the tribe begins to scatter even as Jensen lands first and scrambles to the ground, yelling as loudly as he can. "Stay where you are! Stay! There is no danger! No danger!" he repeats, shouting at the top of his lungs, another cry goes up.

" _Toruk Macto_!"

It's Tsu'tey who realizes it first, who leaps nimbly up onto the tallest root of the Mother Tree to proclaim it as loudly as possible. " _Toruk Macto_!"

Jared forces his mount to fold its wings, jumps to the ground and runs toward Tsu'tey, who meets him halfway, claps both hands on Jared's shoulders.

"Tsu'tey..."

But Tsu'tey isn't minded to listen just yet. "Ìla'rey! It is _Toruk_. You are _Toruk Macto_ ," he breathes, his expression a mixture of awe and joy. "You have fulfilled the destiny of the ancestors!"

Jensen risks interrupting. "The tribes must be united, and only _Toruk Macto_ could do it. Jared's ancestor was _Toruk Macto_ , and all of history is changing now, a thousand years later. It was time."

Tsu'tey rounds on him, but he's visibly uncertain. "You..."

"It was Jensen who brought me to _Toruk_ ," Jared says firmly. "Without him, I would not be _Toruk Macto_. We will unite the tribes, fight against the Sky People, but all together. The Omaticaya alone cannot prevail."

" _Toruk Macto_ can't lead the tribes without the blessing of the chief," Jensen adds. "Tsu'tey, brother, will you ride with us? We will ask the other tribes to unite with us, but we will need you to lead the Omaticaya, just as the other chiefs will lead their tribes. Be the first to come with us, please!"

Tsu'tey clasps Jared's wrist just above the pulse point then turns and, after a moment's pause, clasps Jensen's as well, his grip firm and unwavering. "I will fly with you, _Toruk Macto_. We will bring the people to victory!"

Many years from now, Jensen will tell the story. "We rode out to the four winds," he will say. "To the horse clans of the plain, to the _ikran_ people of the mountains. When _Toruk Macto_ called them, they came."

It sounds much more impressive than the frantic call to war, the impassioned pleas they make to the clan leaders. But in the end, no one wants to be left behind when it's the voice of _Toruk Macto_ , filled with the power of ancestral prophecy, that calls to them. Jared brings Jensen with him, riding aloft on the back of _Toruk_ , but it soon becomes clear after that that they are perilously short on real, tangible intelligence that will tell them how to go after their enemy. So he does the only thing he can do, which is to regroup with Norm and Trudy at the newly-relocated base camp, and try to formulate their own plan of attack. He leaves his avatar under Jared's guard, forcing himself back into his own body if only to eat and drink and make sure that he doesn't jeopardize everything by letting himself grow too weak to maintain the link.

Their only source of intel is Max, and his latest report isn't encouraging.

His voice shakes over the comm, the fear evident in his face. "I don’t know how secure this channel is," he says, glancing over his shoulder. "I can't stay for long."

"Talk fast," Jensen urges.

"It’s crazy here, Jensen. It’s full mobilization. They’re rigging the shuttles as bombers. They’ve made up these big pallets of mine explosives for some kind of shock and awe campaign, I think. It looks like they're just going to try to flatten everything in sight."

"Fuckin’ daisycutters," Trudy mutters under her breath.

"We're screwed," Norm buries his head in his hands, even as Max hurriedly switches off the comm at the first hint of a commotion nearby.

"And I was hoping for some sort of tactical plan that didn't involve martyrdom," Trudy addresses the ceiling of the mobile outpost. "We're going up against gunships with bows and arrows. Tell me how this isn't the same as just pointing my chopper at the base and politely requesting that they shoot me out of the sky?"

Jensen grits his teeth, because he knows she's right. But they still have to try. "I have fifteen clans out there," he points out. "That's two thousand warriors. We know these mountains. We fly them. You fly them. They don't. Their instruments won't work up here, missile tracking won't work —they'll have to fire line of sight. If they bring this fight to us, then we'll have the home field advantage."

"You know he’s gonna commit those bombers straight to the Well of Souls," Trudy says.

"If he takes out the Well of Souls, it’s over. It’s their main line to Eywa, to their ancestors —it’ll destroy them," Norm adds, entirely unnecessarily.

"Then I guess we better stop them," Jensen says grimly. He gave the information to Quaritch on a platter, before he knew what it meant.

"Jensen, no offence, but you couldn't stop a lemur from licking your hand right now," Trudy says bluntly. "You just got the crap beaten out of you, and if we're honest, you weren't doing too good before that."

"So everyone keeps telling me," Jensen sighs, as though even breathing isn't an exercise in pain.

"At the very least, you need to get some rack before we try anything."

Jensen look down, clasps his hands in his lap to keep them from shaking, offers up the most shit-eating grin he can muster. "Gonna have to settle for coffee for now. I'll sleep when I'm dead."

"Yeah, that's what we're worried about."

* * *

Eventually Jensen, Jared and Tsu'tey agree to stop trying to actively bring in more of the tribes. Already the vast majority have joined in, and runners have been sent out to the more remote tribes on the off-chance that they might make it back in time. It's been days, though, and they have run out of time. There's nothing left now, no choice except to fight down to the last man and woman, to make the invaders pay for their actions as dearly as possible. Jensen's stomach is roiling, threatening to empty itself at any moment. He's been in his avatar for well over twenty-four hours now, needing to be with the other warriors as much as possible. They're looking to Jared, to Tsu'tey for guidance, and to a lesser extent to him, if only because he's the one with the most insight into the enemy's weakness. Jensen knows this much about warfare, no matter where it takes place or what race is waging war against what race: without troop morale, there's no point in waging a war at all.

He's been spending as much time as possible linked up to his avatar, only breaking contact for a few minutes a day for food and water before linking up again. He can't spare too many thoughts for his human body, lying battered and neglected in its link bed. All he can do is keep his fingers crossed that it will survive long enough for him to see this through. Keep his fingers crossed, and pray.

It's with that thought in mind that he finds himself walking down the path to the Well of Souls in the evening. He figures Quaritch and his forces won't attack until dawn —night attacks are only useful if you're planning on exploiting the element of surprise, and Quaritch knows they know he's coming. He doesn't need the element of surprise, anyway. He'll be coming in from the air and simply trying to carpet-bomb the entire area.

Before long Jensen is standing underneath the Mother Tree, staring up into the branches, the hanging tendrils undulating softly, their white glow pulsating gently in the darkness. Even like this, it's easy to imagine a presence there, though he'll be damned if he can tell what it is. He takes a breath, grabs the end of his braid before he can change his mind, kneels at the base of the tree, allows his the tendrils of his tswin to coil around those of the tree. There's a familiar jolt of sensation, a flood of emotions he can only barely keep at bay.

"I, uh," he clears his throat, "I never pray. I'm not really the type. Back home, our God, well, He's not around much. But...I figure I should talk to you. I might just be talking to a tree, but I don't think I am."

"Listen... if Grace is there with you, then you know what I'm talking about. You can look into her memories. If you can, or if you want, you can look into mine, too...you can see what humans can do, what our world looks like now. Nothing grows there anymore, because we weren't paying attention. We're not all like that, but the ones who are coming? It's going to be bad."

"You chose me for something, all those months ago. At least, that's what Jared thinks. Ila'rey. When all the _atokirina_ floated by. So, I'm gonna honour that choice. I'm gonna stand and fight, and I'm not gonna quit, not until they cut me down. But I'm just one guy, and there are ten billion humans back where I come from. If they decided to, they could come down on this place like a never-ending rain. So I'll fight to keep them out, but I could use a little help, here. Anyway, that's it. Thanks for listening."

Jensen pushes himself to his feet, the bond severing itself automatically, and finds himself facing Jared, whose approach he never even sensed. "Oh, uh, hey. How long have you been there?"

Jared looks at him sadly. "Jensen, the Great Mother does not choose sides. Eywa protects only the balance of life. You know this. She does not want war."

Jensen shrugs. "Sometimes prayer works, back where I come from. It was worth a shot. This war... it's not going to preserve the balance of life anywhere. Too many people are going to die already for this."

Jared nods. "I know."

That's when it occurs to Jensen that maybe the reason Jared is here isn't because he followed him in. "Jared, do you want me to leave? If you want to be alone..."

But Jared shakes his head. "My mother has given me her staff..."

"What?"

"I am not ready for this burden," he says, to Jensen's surprise. "First I ride the _Toruk_ , and now the staff... I never wanted to carry it. I never wanted to be tsahik, Jensen. My mother prepares to join Eywa, and I am alone now."

On impulse Jensen steps forward, cups the back of Jared's head with one hand and pulls until their foreheads are just barely touching. "You're not alone."

Jared's breath hitches ever so slightly. "I don't want this."

"I know," Jensen says gently. "But sometimes life really doesn't give a rat's ass about what we want."

That gets a surprised huff of laughter, and Jared presses closer to him, his breath warm on Jensen's lips. "Will you stay with me tonight?" he asks softly. "After tomorrow, there is nothing certain."

Jensen nods, can't help but wonder if, after tomorrow, there will be anything left of him either. "Of course I'll stay."

It's nothing like their first night together. Jared curls around him on the soft ground, and Jensen lets himself be pulled up snugly against Jared's broad chest, their tswin entwining seemingly of their own accord. There's no electric current of desire this time, just a lingering sweetness tinged with sorrow, the feel of Jared's skin pressed up against his own, mirrored by his skin against Jared's, until Jensen no longer knows or cares which sensation originated where. He feels himself slide a hand along Jared's waist almost before he consciously decides to do it, brushes his lips against the tender spot where Jared's jaw meets his neck, just below the ear, and is rewarded with a full-body shiver.

This time when Jared rocks against him, penetrating him with two fingers all at once, he feels as if he's known this was coming for months, or maybe years. There's no surprise, no shock, just a familiar pleasure that suffuses him, a feeling that it takes him longer than it should to recognize as happiness. He pushes back a little, reaches between them to where he's achingly hard, cock trapped against his stomach with a friction that's at once wonderful and yet not enough, only to have Jared push his hand away and replace it with his own, stroking and twisting until Jensen is writhing, gasping quietly against Jared's mouth. When he finally comes —echoing Jared's own near-simultaneous climax— it seems to last forever, like he's caught in this moment eternally, one of those insects suspended in amber. Jared makes a soft sound of contentment, moves his hands up to clasp Jensen's shoulders, keeping him drawn close into his arms.

They're still inextricably entwined in each other when Jared drifts to sleep, Jensen struggling to stay awake. Neither of them is willing to let go just yet, not until the harsh light of day brings them inexorably closer to the end of everything.

* * *

Jensen has never seen so many people amassed all at once, not even when he was caught in the peak of the action back on Earth. The style of combat back home was always to move in small units —quick to get in and out, precision work rather than massing on a large scale. This is troop movement on a scale he only knows about in theory, let alone learned how to lead. He's sort of glad that Jared is the one who is nominally in charge of all these people. Except, of course, that it's Jensen's plan of attack, and he's the one to whom, ultimately, they're going to turn to when the shit inevitably hits the fan.

Preparations begin long before dawn. The warriors each have their own rituals, each tribe their own war paint that they apply to _pa'li_ and _ikran_ alike, tracing elaborate patterns on hide and wing, preparing them for battle in some way that Jensen can't even begin to understand. Jared attempts to explain it to him, but his stomach is filled with butterflies, his mind buzzing with anxiety, and he only half-listens to the explanation as he tries with limited success to apply his own paint to Beidai, who tosses her head impatiently, no doubt picking up on his anxiety even though they aren't joined yet.

For a while, when the sun is still so low over the horizon that the whole forest is still bathed in the glow of pink and orange rays, Jensen allows himself the wild, desperate hope that this is all unnecessary, that by some miracle Quaritch and Selfridge will somehow have seen reason and won't bother attacking. That a message will come that they want to renegotiate terms. He climbs onto Beidai's back, pats her neck reassuringly, finds himself waiting for something, anything. A sign, maybe. Off to the side, Jared has mounted _Toruk_ , and the great leonopteryx tosses its head in impatience, as though it wants nothing more to take to the sky, to lay waste to everything in its path. It tosses its head again, and Jensen thinks he might not be so far off in his initial assessment. _Toruk_ is the ultimate predator, and what predator is content without prey?

They fly high into the mountains, join the wild banshees perched upon the sheer walls of the floating rocks, and wait. The world seems to hold its breath,

When the first bomb hits, a section of the forest goes up in flames, and another fireball strikes, barely twenty yards from the first. It's all the signal Jensen needs. Beidai hurls herself into the air, spreading her wings with a surge of elation. Jensen feels rather than sees Jared take flight on the _Toruk's_ back, and with a few beats of the banshee's wings he finds himself aloft, flying to meet the fleet of ships coming toward them at top speed, followed by hundreds of banshee riders, leathery wings beating a fearsome tattoo. The fleet itself isn't that big, Jensen knows, but it's big enough. The sky before him is filled with Samson tilt-rotors, looking for all the world like armoured beetles, the same kind of ship Trudy flies on a regular basis. They're the smallest and quickest of all the ships, although they'll never beat the banshees for speed and manoeuvrability.

Leading the formation is Quaritch's Dragon. It's the largest thing in the sky, larger even than _Toruk_ , huge and hulking, its guns bigger than some of vehicles. It's flanked by two Scorpion ships, and if Quaritch were smart, Jensen thinks, he'd be on board one of the Scorpions, using the Dragon as a distraction. But Jensen knows better. The Dragon is Quaritch's flagship, his pride and joy, and Quaritch is convinced that he's invincible. He's going to be on board that ship, Jensen can sense it, knows it like he knows his own name. The tilt-rotors are swarming in front of him, hovering and darting in and out of formation, serving as protection for the huge Valkyrie shuttles that once served to bring passengers down from orbital transport, and which are now, Jensen knows, packed to the gills with ground troops, many of them in ampsuits. The wave sweeps toward the mountains, bearing down on Jensen and the Na'vi forces like a tsunami straight out of the mouth of hell.

As much as Jensen wants to launch his forces at the threat directly, as much as he's itching to just jump in the fight and do what he does best, he forces himself to stay calm, sends a calming pulse through the bond to Beidai. He reaches up to the walkie-talkie strapped to his shoulder.

"Does everyone still read me?"

There are only five radios, and so he's given one to Jared who's leading the whole outfit, and one to Norm who's accompanying the leader of the ground troops. He and Tsu'tey have the remaining two free ones, and of course there's the radio in Trudy's Samson. There's a crackle of static, but everyone answers him, loud and clear on the channel.

"All right, let's do this!"

* * *

It's a bloodbath.

Even from the start, Jensen knew it was a long shot. They all did, and yet they all came anyway, all the Na'vi from miles around, united against a common enemy. For the first few minutes things go their way, which surprises him to no end. The banshees swarm above the human gunships, darkening the sky, and soon the air is filled with the sound of gunfire and the screaming of warriors as they sent arrows winging at the vulnerable spots of the Samsons that Jensen told them to aim for. One by one the enemy ships find themselves out of control as the glass of their cockpits shatters under the impact of massive arrows and the pilots are either impaled or suffocate in the unbreathable atmosphere.

From his vantage point Jensen can't see what's taking place on the ground, and he has to trust to Norm and the others leading the ground troops to know what they're doing, to stick to the plan. They're outgunned but not outmanned —two thousand Na'vi against less than a hundred trained mercenaries, two hundred if you count the miners who've been given arms and told to shoot anything that moves. It's the only advantage the Na'vi have, and it's not much in the face of the incendiary rounds that are ripping apart the forest below, nothing in the face of the huge bombs that Quaritch is prepared to drop, preferring to raze the entire world rather than concede a single inch of ground.

Jensen has never led troops into battle before. He's never been anywhere other than in the thick of the fighting on the ground, in quick, dirty skirmishes that took place in the pre-dawn gloom against enemies whose faces were all so similar to his that they blurred into an indistinct mass. He's never been aloft like this, never been responsible for the lives of so many, and it's easy to lose track, easy to let himself be swept along by the high of battle-fever. Beidai careens through the air, instinctively drawn to the side of _Toruk_ , fighting in tandem with the great leonopteryx, but she has to swoop away at the last minute to avoid being rammed by a Scorpion, and Jensen loses track even of the massive form of _Toruk_ in the confusion. He brings Bedai around, shouting at the others to regroup as he realizes that the tilt-rotors are trying to scatter them, isolate each banshee so they can be picked off one by one, then aims himself directly at the Dragon, firing arrow after arrow into the open bay doors where the soldiers are preparing the huge pallets that Max warned him about.

"Jared!" he yells into his mic. "Jared we need to split up and concentrate on the Dragon! The Dragon, Jared!"

He doesn't know if Jared hears him. There's a burst of static, then the sound of distant orders being yelled above the fray, and the banshees begin to come about, but slowly, far too slowly. Jensen fires his last arrow, snatches up the spear that he lashed loosely to Beidai's back, hurtles directly at the remaining soldiers who are scrambling to regroup themselves, to find replacements and execute their orders. He knocks one aside, dimly aware of Jared off in the distance, the great form of the _Toruk_ taking hold of a Samson as though it were nothing more than a turtle-dove and tearing it apart with mighty jaws and talons. Tsu'tey's banshee is dead, and he's alone in the cargo bay of the Dragon, using his bow as a makeshift staff, knocking soldiers out of the ship to go falling to their doom.

Beidai shrieks and jerks under him even as he's trying for another pass, and suddenly they're falling, hurtling toward the forest canopy so fast that all Jensen can see are wisps of cloud and spray hurtling past, his mind filled with the pain and terror of his dying mount. With a desperate effort he forces her to spread her wings one last time as they crash into the tops of the first trees and tumble headlong toward the ground, their fall barely broken by the broad, strong leaves of the trees. Beidai lands hard, cushioning his fall, and he only just manages to retain his seat long enough not to fall off and break his neck. He rolls to the ground, shaken and winded, the whole world spinning as he tries to tell up from down, still bound to Bedai in the throes of death.

"Beidai..." he crawls back to her, reaches out to place a hand on her neck, feels the small surge of comfort the motion produces. "I'm so sorry... _Ngari hu eywa salew tirea, tokx 'ì'awn,_ " he repeats the words of the hunt, even as he feels the last of her life ebb away.

The bond severs.

* * *

When Jensen staggers to his feet a few moments later, the sounds of the battle are ringing in his ears. All around there's nothing but death. The forest is burning, littered with the bodies of Na'vi and humans alike, along with the carcases of their mounts and the smouldering remains of broken-down ampsuits. Smoke coils along the ground, among the splintered and burning trees, the ground churned to a bloody slurry, the water of the streams running in crimson eddies toward the river. A direhorse canters by, its mane on fire, its whinny so shrill it's barely recognizable as belonging to a living creature. He reels, sick and disoriented, hears Trudy's voice come over the intercom.

"Rogue One is hit! I'm going in! Sorry, Jensen..."

He keys his mic, finds himself automatically requesting a report, but only Jared answers him, and the answer is curt and barely audible before disappearing in another welter of static. Jensen takes a few faltering steps, goes to his knees, eyes filling with tears. All around him, Pandora is dying, and it's all his fault. It's his fault, and nothing he does now is going to change all that. He squeezes his eyes shut, feeling as though every single part of him has turned to stone, weighing him down, pinning him to the spot.

He's so lost in his misery that he barely registers the first creatures running past him, only comes to his senses when the ground begins to tremble beneath him like an earthquake. His eyes snap open and he barely has time to hurl himself out of the way as a herd of sturmbeest thunder past, the entire forest quaking at their passage. A flock of what seems like thousands of parrots swoops by in a flurry of brilliant reds and blues and purples, shrieking and cawing. The forest is crawling with life all around him, with lemurs and stingbats springing from tree to tree, and clouds of orange and green insects come seemingly out of nowhere to swarm the remaining human troops.

"Jensen! Eywa has heard you! Eywa has heard you!"

Jensen's heart feels like it's going to explode in his chest when he hears Jared's jubilant voice ringing out clearly over the comm. Jensen lets out a whoop of triumph, even as the forest continues to burn around him. Off to the side a gunner fires from the door of a stranded Samson, only to be ripped from his position by a banshee lunging in and burying its razor-sharp teeth into his neck. Other banshees tear at the pilot’s windshield, leaving him barely enough time to scream and throw up his arms in a useless attempt to shield himself from death.

Overhead the huge Dragon ship is going down in flames, careening out of the sky, taking Quaritch down with it. Further above it, the _Toruk_ swoops in enormous circles, following it down in a controlled spiral, screeching its victory to the skies. Jensen watches in awe as, all around, the ground troops scatter in disarray, chased down by viperwolves, trampled by sturmbeest. The animals flash past him, ignoring him completely, until he feels an ominous prickling sensation on the back of his neck. Turning slowly, he finds himself eye to eye with an enormous Thanator, newly-emerged from the smoke behind him. For a moment it's his first day in the jungle all over again, and he's nothing but an ignorant jarhead with no notion of what's in front of him. He stands frozen before the Thanator's gaze, waiting for death, until all at once the beast lowers itself to the ground, stretching out its front paws stiffly in obvious invitation, waiting.

"You've got to be kidding me," Jensen breathes, but there's no mistaking what's happening here.

A running leap has him astride the monster's back, his tswin entwining with the Thanator's, and power like he's never felt before surges through him, primal and ferocious and thirsting for blood. Before he knows it they're crashing through the smouldering jungle, knocking aside what few soldiers are left with great, sweeping strikes of the creatures massive claws. They soldiers are milling about in complete disorganization, panicked and shooting at shadows, desperate just to escape. High above Jensen's head he hears the shriek of the _Toruk_ , knows that this isn't over, not by a long shot.

"Come on," he urges the Thanator. "Quaritch ain't the type to lie down and die that easy."

He finds the Dragon lying half-submerged in the lake where he and Jared once went swimming, the lilies ripped up by their roots by the crash, petals crushed and scattered, scarcely a hundred yards from where the mobile unit containing Jensen's human body lies. It doesn't take long before Jensen spots a figure rising from the water, riding a fully-functional ampsuit. It's Quaritch, his face visibly bloody even from Jensen's vantage point, his eyes burning with unchecked madness. He slogs out of the water, covered with mud, then strides purposefully into the forest, gaze firmly fixed on his goal—the mobile unit where Jensen and Norm's human bodies are still in their link beds, completely defenceless. They'd been painfully short of resources and left the station unguarded, hoping it might go unnoticed for the duration of the battle, but there's no mistaking that Quaritch knows exactly where he's going now.

Jensen catches up with him just as he reaches the clearing where the units have been hidden for the past few days. His only hope now is to distract the Colonel from his objective, to keep him away from those units at all costs until help can come for it. Already he can hear Jared's voice coming over the comms, promising that he's on his way.

"It's over, Quaritch!" he yells, as the _Toruk's_ cries grow closer, although it's still much too far to be of any good to him now.

"Nothing’s over while I’m breathing!"

Quaritch hasn't so much as bothered to turn toward him, intent on destroying the outpost before Jensen can get to it, but he hasn't banked on just how strong and fast the Thanator really is. The great cat clears the distance in a single bound, knocking the ampsuit several yards to the side, although Quaritch's incredible control of the machine prevents it from toppling over. For a few seconds Jensen thinks he might actually gain the upper hand, the Thanator's claws tearing at the suit and opening fissures in the canopy —right until Quaritch pulls the trigger on his GAU-90, and Jensen feels the animal buckle beneath him, its life bleeding into the wet ground even before it has time to fall completely.

He manages to twist free before he gets trapped beneath the great corpse, barely manages to roll away before the ampsuit's huge arm comes crashing down right where he lay a moment ago in an attempt to crush him. The canopy is cracked beyond repair, but Quaritch has already ejected it, donning a re-breather mask instead, the better to fight with his opponent. Distantly Jensen is aware of someone shouting his name —Jared, he thinks, but there's no time to dwell on it now. Quaritch reaches down again, and he parries the great arm with the splintered remains of a piece of the suit that the Thanator ripped free during its initial attack. Quaritch redoubles his attacks, driving Jensen back inexorably, until finally a lucky blow sends Jensen tumbling head over heels to land several dozen yards away, winded and helpless. Instead of coming after him to deliver the coup de grace, though, Quaritch carefully steps back toward the mobile unit, and under Jensen's horrified stare, deftly rips a gaping hole in the roof. He brings the great arm of his ampsuit crashing down into the unprotected insides, and Jensen feels himself falling.

A moment later Jensen is back in his original body, pain slamming into him from all sides. He chokes, tries to pull in a breath, but the air is already beginning to burn in his lungs. He shoves weakly at the splintered lid of the link bed, destroyed by Quaritch's last attack, finds himself staring up into the smoky sky. For a few terrible seconds that feel like years he can't find the strength to free himself from the confines of the link, scrabbling helplessly to even get so far as to turn over. The emergency exopack is hanging on the wall less than ten feet away, but it may as well be ten miles for all the good it does him. Finally he manages to hook a hand over the side of the link bed and pulls himself free. He collapses in a heap on the floor, his back shrieking in agony as he tries to pull himself along. He inches forward, lungs on fire as he tries to hold his breath, reaching out with one hand until the tips of his fingers brush against the hose. He yanks on it, but it doesn't come loose, and the effort of trying again proves too much. He falls back to the floor, mouth opening and closing fruitlessly, and when the darkness closes in he thinks with some bemusement that dying feels nothing like how he thought it would.

For a while there is nothing at all, and then he opens his eyes again, finds himself staring up at the foggy interior of a re-breather mask, Jared's worried face staring down at him.

"Jensen, Jensen can you breathe?"

He's not sure anymore, but he tries to nod. He can taste blood in his mouth, wonders just how badly all of this has screwed him up, but at least he's not going to die. He's cradled in Jared's lap, safe enough for now, it seems. Above Jared's head the sky is still filled with smoke, with the silhouettes of hundreds of banshees circling. He mouths 'Quaritch?' at Jared, who shakes his head.

"He is dead. We have won, Jensen."

"Good," his voice is strangled, strange to his own ears. He swallows a mouthful of his own blood, wonders if maybe he wasn't premature in thinking he wasn't going to die, after all. "Glad...I got to see you again."

"I am glad, too. We will get you help, Jensen. You can't die now."

"Not so bad," he tries to reassure him. "Can't live in two worlds anyway. Not real..."

To his surprise, Jared bends and presses a kiss to the plastic of his re-breather mask. "You are real to me, Jensen Ackles."

Jensen opens his mouth, finds he can't draw enough breath to speak again, smiles instead, and is rewarded with a smile in return from Jared.

"I see you."


	6. Rebirth

**Epilogue —Rebirth**

Jensen spends most of the next few days drifting in and out of consciousness, aided in no small part by the massive doses of painkillers that Max administers to him with Norm's blessing. Jensen mutters darkly about traitors but can't keep his eyes open long enough to see the worried looks on their faces. Norm isn't in great shape himself, badly shaken from having his avatar killed while he was still linked to it, but he's soldiering gamely on, clinging to sanity like a lifeline. Jensen was too panicked, trying to get to the emergency re-breather mask, to see what happened to Norm, but he found out later that the avatar had died long before Quaritch and Jensen had ever come near the outpost, catapulting Norm back to his human body and leaving him to crawl, barely lucid enough to grab one of the spare exopacks, back to the relative safety of the Omaticaya.

He's being sent back to Earth, along with every single other human left alive on Pandora, Trudy and Max included, as well as the remaining avatar drivers –who'd been locked up the minute there was any sign of real trouble, lest their loyalties prove to be with Jensen and the Na'vi. . Selfridge, who somehow managed to escape with his life if not his dignity, has made it clear that the Pandora project is a write-off as far as he's concerned. Two transports are heading back to Earth, one with most of the military personnel, the other with the civilians –a safeguard put in place to make sure Trudy, Max and Norm don't find themselves on the wrong end of someone's gun or knife on the voyage back. Not that they really expect trouble, but Jensen would rather not take chances with that.

With the humans gone, there will be no one left to man the equipment here, whatever is left when it's all dismantled and shipped back to Earth along with the people. It quickly becomes apparent that the relays have been sabotaged, no doubt Quaritch's work, which makes it impossible to send word through the relays or to get anything back, for that matter. There has been complete radio silence for weeks, with no way of telling what awaits them back home until the transports physically reach the first working relay station several dozen light years away.

Against all of Max's instructions, Jensen spends what time he's awake and conscious linked up to his avatar, coordinating the evacuation. His own decision has been made, although it was harder than he ever thought it would be. In a way, it feels like choosing between two different kinds of death, rather than between life and death. He wonders if Grace felt the same way, when she underwent the process. He can't go back, though, he knows this. Even if he survived the voyage back, which is unlikely according to Max —something about the strain of being put into cry and then taken out again being too much for his system to take after everything that's happened— there's more to tie him here than there is to link him back to the planet he once thought would be his only home.

Everything in his life before he came here was done for his family, to make sure they were taken care of. Put Tommy through university, get his parents off the ranch. Now, though, Tommy's gone and has been for years, and if all the money he's sent home isn't enough to help them, then it's likely nothing ever will be enough. He's sending back a message to be delivered by the returning crew, along with the remnants pay he'd been setting aside for his own surgery. There's no need for it now. He still misses his parents, but even before he came here, even before his accident, it had been years since he'd been home. Years since he'd done more than exchange a couple of messages a year with them. They've lived without him for nearly seven years, he tells himself, they'll be able to manage.

These past few months mark the first time he's ever done something solely for himself. It was a bit of a shock when he first realized it, but he finds it's not so uncomfortable an idea as he thought it would be. Jared is the best thing that ever happened to him, although he feels guilty about everything Jared has had to sacrifice for him. None of the Omaticaya are questioning their bond anymore, but the question of Jared's needing a successor is still up in the air. Jared himself seems pretty sanguine about it, pointing out that it's not just his own children who are born with the gift, that they can always foster a child to become the next _tsahik_. Or at least, that's what Jensen thinks he said, unfamiliar with the actual Na'vi word he used. He's not sure he understands any of it, but he's too damned selfish to let Jared go, so he just goes along with it as though he understands. Maybe, he reasons with himself, someday he will.

He falls asleep almost the moment he emerges from the link for the last time, exhausted beyond the limits of endurance. He barely has the energy upon waking to pull himself into his chair, aided by Max, who fusses until Jensen has to wave him off.

"Quit clucking," he manages, arms wrapped around his aching ribs as Max pushes his wheelchair toward the main doors. "I just have to last long enough to get out there."

Max scowls disapprovingly. "That’s what I’m worried about."

There’s nothing to say to that, so Jensen stays silent until they get to the main doors, dons his re-breather mask when Max hands it to him, lets himself be hauled up into the waiting tilt-rotor. He watches Norm and Max, standing at a safe distance from the tilt-rotor, waves weakly at them as the motor hums to life, and they wave in return. They already said their goodbyes. When Trudy returns, they'll get on the last transport out, leaving Pandora to the Na'vi once more.

Jensen drifts once he’s buckled into his seat, oblivious to Trudy’s worried glances, watching the world go by in a blur of colour until they set down in the clearing closest to the Omaticaya’s new settlement. Jared is waiting just at the edge of the clearing, hands on his hips, looking at once fearsome and a little nervous, a combination Jensen can’t help but find endearing. Jared hesitates when he sees him, then visibly steels himself and pulls himself up into the chopper, bending down so that he can both fit inside and look Jensen in the face even from his great height. It feels a little like being loomed over by the Friendly Giant, Jensen thinks, giddy from the painkillers Max forced on him before they left. They're probably a good thing, the only thing keeping him conscious, but they've also made everything a little fuzzy around the edges.

"You are ready to leave?"

Jensen nods, grits his teeth when Jared easily lifts him out of his seat and into his arms, cradling him like a child. He can’t help but suck in a pained breath when the movement jostles his ribs, and Jared gives him a worried glance.

"You are well?"

"I’m okay for now. Let’s blow this popsicle stand. I’ll explain later," he adds when it’s obvious Jared has no idea what he’s talking about. " _Hasta luego_ , Trudy," he turns his head toward her, summoning up the remnants of his high school Spanish. " _Gracias por todo_."

She grins. " _De nada_. You watch yourself, okay? I didn't go through all this shit so you could get yourself eaten by a Thanator."

"You got it."

* * *

It feels strange, seeing the forest like this through the protective plastic of his mask rather than with his own eyes. The colours are slightly muted, the sounds not as clear, but he thinks that might have something to do with just how difficult he’s finding it to cling to consciousness. He lets his head rest against Jared’s chest, eyes at half-mast, decides that he should probably feel a little embarrassed at how safe he feels like this, protected and cherished, but finds he can’t muster the energy for it. It’s all he can do just to keep awake, to breathe through the pain that’s become his constant companion for the past ten days. Jared strides through the woods with newfound confidence, easily scales the huge tree that the Omaticaya have chosen as their new home without so much as breaking a sweat, even with Jensen in his arms.

Jensen hasn’t had the chance yet to see Jared’s new living space—their new living space, he reminds himself—but even once they’re inside he can’t appreciate it fully. His back and ribs are on fire, his lungs protesting every breath he draws, sweat beading on his face even though this should barely count as exertion. Jared lays him down carefully on a pallet, gently stretching him out until he’s lying flat on his back. For a few moments Jensen loses track of him, can only hear vague scuffling sounds as he moves around, making preparations. Finally he appears again, expression serious.

"I must prepare you now."

Jensen nods, tries not to stiffen up too much as Jared removes his clothes, one item at a time, moving slowly and painstakingly so as not to hurt him accidentally. For a moment Jared pauses, looking at him wonderingly.

"You are so small like this," he says, and although Jensen figures he should probably feel insulted by the comment, he isn’t, not really.

"It’s not the size that counts, it’s what you do with it," he jokes, and is rewarded by a smile.

Jared takes a breath, picks up a small container of pigment and begins the laborious process of applying it to Jensen's body, smiling a little when Jensen shivers under his touch, goose bumps forming on his skin as Jared’s fingers brush against him. Self-conscious and maybe just a little turned on by the gentleness and reverence with which Jared is treating him, Jensen smiles back, determinedly fixes his eyes on the roof over his head and tries to think of anything other than Jared’s hands marking his skin.

"Hold your breath," Jared says after what feels like an eternity, then lifts the re-breather mask, working as quickly as he can to apply the pigment to Jensen’s face before replacing it. "You are well?" he asks again.

Jensen nods, grimaces. "Never better."

He watches as Jared strips off his hunter’s vestments and pulls on the intricately-woven bead necklace that will show his rank as tsahik, living embodiment of the will of Eywa. Jared deftly begins applying several different colours of pigment to his own skin in a pattern far more intricate than the one on Jensen’s own body with a skill that says this is not the first time he has done this. Jensen wonders if he was made to practice on himself, or if he had to do this during official ceremonies even before he tried to help Grace. He wasn't painted, then.

"You are ready?" Jared asks when he’s done.

"Ready as I’ll ever be."

"Then we will go now."

* * *

Jared carries him easily to the gathering place by the _Vitraya Ramunong_ , cradled against his chest. Jensen doesn’t even have the time to feel awkward about being entirely naked in front of the tribe before he’s laid down at the foot of the Mother Tree, side by side with the sleeping form of his avatar. If he turns his head he can see that the body has been similarly prepared, naked save for white, black and yellow pigment applied in an intricate swirling pattern from head to foot. The avatar looks peaceful, curled into a foetal position on its side. At Jared’s urging, Jensen turns as much as he can onto his side, and when positioning his own legs proves too painful Jared kneels to help him.

"All will be well," he says softly, laying his hand over Jensen’s heart.

Jensen swallows hard and nods, wishes they weren’t separated by the plastic of his mask. If all goes well, when this is over, they won’t be. He takes comfort in the steadiness of Jared’s hands, feels the frantic hammering of his heartbeat slow a bit under his touch.

"Eywa will take you up in her arms," Jared says, raising his voice so that it can be heard by everyone gathered there, "and she will guide your crossing."

Dimly Jensen is aware of someone translating into Na'vi, but it’s a voice he doesn’t recognize. So many friends dead and gone forever, he thinks numbly, and then all thoughts of the past are driven from his mind as his whole body begins to tingle with a now-familiar sensation. He shivers a little as the Mother Tree reaches toward him, twining delicate tendrils of root-cilia over his body, around his arms and legs, wrapping him gently in its embrace. The world begins to fade, sound and colours washing out until he’s surrounded by nothing but a gentle white light. All around he can hear the soft whisper of the voices of the ancestors, though they’re speaking a language he still can’t understand. He’s shrouded by the tree, rocked and comforted and enfolded, feels himself borne aloft on what feels like a wave, a surge of emotion he can’t begin to quantify. There's light all around. Peace overwhelms him, the crippling pain of the past few days a distant memory. It would be easy, he thinks, just to let go. He’s so damned tired…

 _The choice is yours._

The voice is clear in his mind, like a bell.

"I see," he replies. He’s already made his choice, he just needed a reminder of the direction he’d already picked to travel.

It’s nothing like the way he’s used to forming the link with his avatar. There’s no falling sensation now, only a wave cresting beneath his feet. He’s already left his dying body behind, and he allows himself a moment to let sorrow wash over him for everything he’s leaving, for the death of what was left of his humanity. Then he steels himself, imagines himself stepping forward into the light.

When he awakens again he finds himself staring into a familiar pair of gold-ringed eyes and smiles. Knows that, for the first time, he truly understands what it means to see.

"Ìla’rey," he says, reaching up and placing his hand against Jared’s chest, just over his heart. " _Oel ngati kmeie_."

Jared smiles back. "I see you too, Jensen."

~END~


	7. Thanks & Author's Notes

** Thanks **

There are so many people I need to thank for this fic, I scarcely know where to start. So, in no particular order of importance, here we go:

 **folkin_up_again** : My artist, who put up with my being extraordinarily late with the 'final' rough draft of this story because I was beating my head against it like a metaphorical brick wall. She is an absolute doll and took my harassing emails and nit-picking comments with good grace, and worked extremely hard on all the graphics that you can find on her post. I am so incredibly impressed with the quality of some of the manips she did for this story, especially considering this was her first time doing it. If you haven't gone over to look at her art and leave feedback, I suggest you do so now. Go ahead, I'll wait. ;)

 **peppervl** : My beta, who is an absolute rockstar. She encouraged me to write, commiserated when Jared and Jensen just _would not have sex already_ , gave me pats when I remembered I was writing RPS and started flipping out, and delivered ass-kickings when necessary. She then turned around on a dime (because, again, I was stupidly late finishing the first draft) and delivered one of the most devastating critiques of a story I have ever received. You would not believe the amount of extraneous crap she pruned out of this story. There's an entire prologue that's no longer there, and you can thank her for sparing you the boredom. Of course, I poked at the story a lot after she gave it back to me, so all remaining errors are very much my own fault.

 **roque_clasique** : This fic is actually all her fault. She posted it as an idea in her LJ last year, and it just stuck with me. For reference, [this](http://roque-clasique.livejournal.com/104053.html) is the post.

 **pkwench** : As usual, she was a relentless cheerleader throughout this whole ordeal. She listened very patiently to me whine, waffle and complain about this story, offered ideas and support even when she was snowed under with work and school and other commitments.

And a big thank you to my flist, because you all are awesome too. It would take far too much space and time to thank everyone individually, but you know who you are! Thank you for your support and your patience and your good humour with me throughout this process. :)

 

 ** Author's Notes **

**WARNING: Notes will contain fic spoilers.**

So first off, oh my God, this story. It came close to ruining my life, I swear. _Avatar_ is a huge, sweeping movie, and it's no secret that the main attraction there are the visuals. I wanted to do justice to the visuals, and maybe try to take the plot a couple of steps further than in the movie. I am not really sure I succeeded, to be quite honest. Overall, I think the story turned out well. It stands on its own, there are no huge inconsistencies, I got all the characters where I wanted them to be.

That being said, I think this story could probably use another few months' work. I had a few problems with certain aspects of the movie, which I attempted to change in the story, and I'm not sure how well I succeeded in that respect. The first thing I wanted to change was the depiction of the Na'vi as noble savages who don't even have a word for 'lie,' because I felt it was a gross oversimplification of what could be a fascinating alien species. This is where I think I really didn't go as far as I could or should have. I managed to hint at the culture, to drop a few bits here and there, but I ended up not digging as deeply into that aspect of the story. The lesson I learned because of this is that I am _not_ C. J. Cherryh, and more's the pity.

I am a little unhappy that I didn't get to spend more time with the secondary characters. I kept the OC names and personalities from the movie and tried to flesh them out a little bit more, especially Norm's character, who in the movie goes from hostile to friendly with very little explanation (I think the extended version/cut scenes explain this better). I also wanted to do a little more digging with regards to Grace, and never ended up having the time. As a result, I'm pretty sure her brief relationship with Jensen feels a little out of place in the story, and I do regret that. Grace is probably my favourite character in the whole of _Avatar_ , and I wanted to play with her some more. I also wanted to look closer into the minds of the other avatar drivers, and ended up having to cut the very few lines I had about that.

Another huge problem I had with the story was the idea of a human coming in and proving himself to be a "better" native than the ones already in place. The idea that Jensen's character would prove himself by riding the great Leonopteryx and suddenly all the tribes would follow him and respect him because he was some sort of figure out of prophecy was highly problematic as far as I was concerned. It also would have made the story entirely about Jensen, when what I really wanted was a story about both boys. So I decided to make Jared the object of the prophecy, and make his own future a little uncertain by playing a bit with gender roles in the Na'vi culture. If his right to succeed his mother was in question, then that would make his success all the more significant. This story is supposed to be as much Jared's coming-of-age story than it is about Jensen finding himself and discovering what's truly important to him after a lifetime of trying to please everyone around him.

Did I mention I'm not C.J. Cherryh? Because I'm not, and this makes me unutterably sad. I wanted to play a lot more with themes of communication breakdown, especially the difficulties of communicating from one alien species to another. C.J. Cherryh is the queen of this, and I tried really hard to follow her example in showing just how alien minds don't work alike, and it really, but really didn't work for me. I don't think it came through at all except once or twice, alas. Also, the Na'vi language is a _bitch_. I never did learn it to my own satisfaction, and I have no doubt that discerning readers who are familiar with Na'vi will be able to pick out all the mistakes I made. I did, however, work very hard to ensure that all the Na'vi I incorporated into the text was either understandable through context, or that it wasn't important to understand it in order to know what was happening in the scene.

In short, while I am quite pleased with how the story turned out, I wish I had another six months to add maybe 50k to it, explore the Na'vi and the other characters, to go and play in this huge and fantastic world.


End file.
